# 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


Witt 


DEDICATION 


TO  PISGAH  AND  HER  PEOPLE: 

In  reverent  memory  of  her  fathers, 
With  loving  hope  for  her  children. 
And  with  grateful  love  for  her 
Men  and  women  of  today. 

THE  AUTHOR. 


"COME  IN  AND  REST  AND  PRAY." 


The  Pisgah  Book 

1784-1909 


A  MEMORIAL,  A  LESSON, 
AN  INSPIRATION 


"Remember  the  days  of  old. 
Consider  the  years  of  many  generations: 
Ask  thy  father  and  he  will  show  thee; 
Thine  elders,  and  they  will  tell  thee." 

Deuteronomy,  xxxii  :  7 


By  W.  O.  SHEWMAKER 

Pastor  of  Pisgah  Church 

at  Pisgah,  Woodford  County,  Kentucky 

1909 


Jforeniorb 


N  preparing  the  following  record  and  sketch  of  Pisgah 
it  has  been  the  purpose  of  the  writer  to  present,  in  as 
convenient,  durable,  and  attractive  form  as  seemed 
practicable,  a  brief,  accurate,  authentic  and  readable 
account  of  the  Pisgah  church  and  community  as  they  have  been, 
and  as  they  are  to-day,  in  order  that  there  might  be  an  available 
and  reliable  record  of  the  chief  events  in  Pisgah's  history,  a  suit- 
able memorial  of  its  past,  and  an  appropriate  souvenir  of  the  one 
hundred  "and  twenty-fifth  anniversary  recently  celebrated  by  the 
church.  It  is  hoped  that  this  purpose  has  been,  at  least  in  part, 
accomplished.  At  any  rate,  the  record  of  Pisgah  is  now  available 
to  all  who  may  be  interested  in  it,  and,  as  far  as  it  has  been  possible, 
with  the  known  sources  of  information,  it  has  been  made  accurate. 
It  is  also  as  complete  as  the  sources  would  permit.  These  sources 
are  chiefly  the  records  of  the  Presbyteries  of  Transylvania  and 
West  Lexington,  the  Session  Books  of  the  Pisgah  church,  the  fare- 
well sermon  of  Dr.  Blythe,  and  certain  family  and  neighborhood 
traditions  which  seem,  as  to  their  essence  at  least,  to  be  trustworthy. 
These  have  been  supplemented  by  the  recognized  authorities,  David- 
son's History  and  Eice's  Memoirs. 

The  labor  and  time  involved  in  the  proper  use  of  all  these  have 
been  greatly  lessened  by  reason  of  the  writer's  having  access  to  the 
careful  and  complete  chronicle  of  the  church,  prepared  at  the 
direction  of  the  Presbytery  of  West  Lexington  for  the  celebration  of 
its  centennial  in  1899,  by  the  painstaking  and  efficient  Clerk  of 
Session  of  the  Pisgah  church.  Dr.  E.  S.  Hart. 

The  record  is  as  full  as  seemed  consistent  with  the  brevity  deter- 
mined upon  at  the  outset.  It  has  been  a  matter  of  regret  that  here- 
tofore we  have  so  largely  neglected  to  record  that  portion  of  our  story 
which  was  in  the  memories,  and  on  the  lips,  of  the  venerable  men 
and  women,  whose  lives  connected  the  present  with  our  remotest 
past,  who  only  lately  have  passed  to  the  bright,  but  unresponding 
shore.  And  it  is  in  the  hope  that  we  who  are  alive  and  remain  may 
take  to  heart  the  lesson  of  this  fact  and  preserve  the  more  carefully, 
for  them  that  come  after  us,  the  continuing  story  of  Pisgah  and  her 
people,  that  tliis  book  is  made. 


THE  GATES  OF  PISGAH. 


1 


Af?  5^5- 


^is^gaf),  ttje  ^lace 


ISGAH  is  not  a  city,  nor  a  town,  nor  even  a  village. 
Nor  does  it  pretend,  or  desire,  to  be  any  of  these.  It 
is  a  railway  station,  a  postoffice,  and  a  community. 
But  besides  these,  and  before  these,  it  is  a  church. 
It  is  the  church  that  has  given  both  name  and  character  to  all  the 
rest.  In  our  own  day  it  is  difficult  for  a  railway  station,  or  a  post- 
office  to  escape  being  labeled  with  the  name  of  some  Jones  or 
Brown,  or  other  person,  or  family,  of  prominence  in  the  locality,  or 
in  the  affairs  of  the  railroad  or  community.  And  when  these 
modern  institutions  were  about  to  be  established  under  the  shadow 
of  the  old  Pisgah  church  that  had  been  founded  before  they  were 
dreamed  of  the  same  rule  would  have  prevailed  had  not  one,  closely 
associated  with  the  railroad,  and  also  a  descendant  of  Pisgah, 
being  aware  of  the  pre-eminence  of  the  church  over  every  other 
institution  of  the  vicinity,  insisted  convincingly  and  successfully 
before  the  less  perfectly  informed  members  of  the  management  that 
the  new  station  and  postoffice  could  bear  no  other  name  than  that 
which  the  whole  region  had  already  borne  for  a  century.  No  less 
noteworthy  is  the  fact  that  the  name  Pisgah  was  given  to  the  settle- 
ment in  the  pioneer  days.  For  in  those  times  by  truer  right,  and 
with  greater  appropriateness,  the  early  settlements  in  Kentucky 
were  called,  in  nearly  every  case,  by  the  names  of  their  founders. 
Thus  there  were  "Boonesborough,"  "Harrod's  Station,"  "Crow's 
Station,"  etc.  And  even  in  the  case  of  the  establishment  of  the 
pious  McAfee  company,  while  their  church  was  called,  with  full 
realization  of  the  meaning  of  the  name,  "New  Providence,"  yet 
their  settlement  was  known,  as  it  is  to  this  day,  by  their  own  name. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  region  round  about  Pisgah  seems  to  have 
never  been  called  by  any  other  name  than  that  with  which  it  may  be 
said  to  have  been  baptized — its  Christian  name,  Pisgah. 

Eight  miles  due  west  of  Lexington,  Ky.,  and  five  miles  from 
Versailles,  on  the  waters  of  the  little  stream  called  Shannon's  Eun, 
a  few  hundred  yards  from  the  station  on  the  Louisville  Southern 
railroad,  a  mile  from  the  Lexington  and  Versailles  turnpike  and 

S 


interurban  trolley  line,  and  fronting  immediately  upon  the  turn- 
pike that  comes  up  from  Fort  Garrett,  crosses  the  Lexington  and 
Versailles  road,  and  leads  to  Mt.  Vernon ;  within  a  short  distance  of 
the  line  separating  the  counties  of  Woodford  and  Fayette,  in  the 
former  of  these  Kentucky  counties,  is  the  site  of  the  building  itself. 
Here  on  a  spot  beautiful  for  situation,  within  the  original  area  of 
two  acres  set  apart  for  her  by  one  of  her  pious  founders  now  marked 
from  the  roadway  by  the  arbor  vitae's  hedge  of  unfailing  green, 
her  gray  stone  walls  covered  with  the  ivy's  clinging  mantle,  guard- 
ing the  sacred  dust  of  the  blessed  dead  that  sleep  at  her  feet,  and 
keeping  ceaseless  vigil  over  the  homes  of  her  children  still  dwel- 
ling on  the  lands  of  their  forefathers,  stands  the  church  that  sym- 
bolizes so  much  in  the  history  of  the  Pisgah  community  and  the 
State  of  Kentucky. 


Cfje  ^torp  of  ^iggaf) 

A  CENTURY  AND  A  QUARTER  OF  HISTORY 

HIS  is  not  a  long  period  in  the  history  of  some 
countries,  such  as  China,  or  Europe,  or  England. 
But  it  is  long  in  the  history  of  the  United  States, 
and  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Kentucky.  It  is  also  a 
longer  lifetime  than  can  be  yet  claimed  by  any  great  proportion  of 
the  churches  of  America.  And  measured  by  events  and  the  prog- 
ress of  history  it  is  actually  a  long  period  in  the  history  of  the 
world — much  longer  than  the  number  of  its  mere  years. 

POLITICAL  CHANGES 

Within  it  are  such  far-reaching  events  as  the  French  revolution, 
the  realization  of  the  British  Empire,  the  freedom  of  South 
America,  the  rise  of  Germany,  the  decay  of  Spain,  the  new  birth  of 
Japan,  and  the  awakening  of  China.  It  begins  also  before  the 
formation  of  the  government  of  the  United  States,  and  includes 
the  entire  history  of  the  American  people  as  a  separate  nationality. 
Pisgah  church  has  witnessed  the  slow  process  of  peacemaking  with 
England  after  the  revolutionar}^  war,  and  the  tedious  labor  of  the 
five  disheartening  years  in  which  the  colonies  strove  to  agree  to  a 
permanent  and  united  government.  When  she  was  already  eight 
years  old  she  heard  as  news  that  she  was  no  longer  a  part  of  Vir- 
ginia, but  of  the  new  State  of  Kentuck5\  And  her  members  doubt- 
less united  with  other  early  congregations  of  Transylvania  Presby- 
tery in  heeding  the  request  of  that  body  that  prayer  be  offered  for 
'God^s  blessing  on  our  army,'  then  marching  under  Mad  Anthony 
Wayne  against  the  Indians. 

LITERARY  EVENTS 

The  first  ministers  of  Pisgah,  in  so  far  as  the}^  had  access  to 
books  of  their  own  day,  were  reading  the  eighteenth  century  writers. 
When  Pisgah  church  was  organized  all  that  great  body  of  litera- 
ture from  which  her  pastors  have  been  quoting  for  the  last  fifty 
years  which  belongs  to  the  age  called  "Victorian,"  was  yet  unwi-itten 

7 


even  as  to  a  single  syllable;  neither  its  writers,  nor  the  great  Queen 
whose  name  it  bears,  had  yet  been  born. 


SCIENTIFIC  DISCOVERIES  AND  INVENTIONS 

In  no  sphere  is  the  period  of  Pisgah's  liistory  of  greater  length, 
so  far  as  can  be  told  by  the  measure  of  events,  than  in  that  of 
science.  The  discoveries  in  the  field  of  pure  science  have  been 
among  the  most  important  ever  made,  while  altogether  the  most 
startling  achievements  ever  wrought  by  man  are  the  inventions  that 
will  always  mark  the  period  as  one  of  the  greatest  in  the  history 
of  man.  In  but  one  sub-division  of  this  great  sphere  we  find  ample 
illustration  of  this  statement.  When  the  pioneers  of  Pisgah  estab- 
lished their  church  there  were  no  railroads  anywhere  in  the  world. 
The  s^^nftest  means  of  transit  on  land  was  by  stage  coach;  they 
traveled  in  the  rich,  but  wilderness  country  of  their  new  location 
on  horse  back,  or  afoot,  over  roads  of  mud,  or  along  the  trail  left 
by  the  Indian,  or  the  buffalo.  On  the  waters  there  was  nothing  that 
went  more  swiftly  than  the  sailing  vessels  that  took  months  for  the 
journeys  now  made  in  days.  For  it  was  twenty-five  years  before 
the  waters  of  the  Hudson  were  stirred  by  the  clumsy  wheels  of  the 
^'Clermont.''  And  now  the  grey  walls  of  the  old  churcli  have  for  long 
given  back  without  alarm  the  echo  of  the  whistle  and  rush  of  the 
train ;  have  become  accustomed  to  the  rattle  of  the  trolley,  and 
even  the  desecrating  honk  of  the  automobile  intruding  upon  the 
sacred  silence  of  her  very  gates.  While  in  all  probability  some  of 
her  lineal  descendants  in  the  State  across  the  river,  which  they 
helped  to  people,  have  been  startled  by  the  wliir  of  the  wings  of  the 
Wrights. 

CHANGES  IN  THE  RELIGIOUS  WORLD 

Nor  have  there  ])een  wanting  in  this  period  great  and  many 
changes  in  the  spliere  with  which  the  life  of  Pisgah  as  a  church  is 
more  intimately  connected.  One  of  these  of  a  world-wide  character 
is  the  modern  foreign  mission  movement.  In  the  narrower  field  of 
Kentucky  alone  Pisgah  has  witnessed,  and  been  affected  by  religious, 
theological,  and  ecclesiastical  movements  that  have  been  of  no  small 
moment  in  the  history  of  the  church  at  large.  In  her  infancy  she 
saw  the  young  commonwealth  given  over  to  "French  infidelity" 
and  the  frivolity  and  vice  tlint  always  accompanied  it,  and  which 

8 


were  the  more  likely  to  appear  where  it  flourished  on  a  wild  and 
new  soil  such  as  Kentucky  was  in  those  days.  The  church  witnessed 
also,  and  profited  by,  the  revival  that  finally  came,  when  in  the 
beginning  of  the  last  century  the  wonders  of  the  triumphs  of  the 
gospel  in  Kentucky  overshadowed  every  other  feature  of  her  pictur- 
esque, exciting,  and  far-famed  life.  She  saw  the  rise,  growth,  and 
at  least  partial  absorption,  of  the  Cumberland  Presbyterian  church. 
She  is  a  quarter  of  a  century  older  than  the  Christian  denomina- 
tion^  one  of  whose  originators  was  a  member  of  the  Presbytery  of 
which  she  is  a  part.  Within  her  own  denomination  she  has  seen 
the  organization  of  the  two  different  Presbyteries  to  which  she 
has  belonged,  the  beginning  of  her  own  Synod,  the  meeting  of  the 
first  General  Assembly  of  the  Presbyterian  church  in  the  United 
States,  the  founding  of  every  theological  seminary  that  the  church 
in  this  country  has  ever  had,  and  besides  the  Cumberland  schism, 
the  break  between  "Old  School"  and  "New  School,"  the  rupture 
brought  about  by  the  war,  the  healing  of  the  former,  and  the  growth 
of  the  two  vigorous  and  effective  Presbyterian  churches,  North 
and  South,  that  were  the  fruits  of  the  latter.  And  yet  we  are 
reminded  of  the  actual  shortness  of  the  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  years  by  the  fact  that  in  the  life  of  Pisgah  church  more  than 
half  of  that  time  has  been  covered  by  the  ministry  of  but  two  men, 
that  of  Eev.  Jas.  Blythe,  who  served  sometimes  as  pastor,  and 
sometimes  as  stated  supply,  but  continuously,  for  forty  years,  and 
that  of  Eev.  Rutherford  Douglas,  whose  pastorate  extended  un- 
broken for  more  than  thirty. 

tlTfje  ^torj)  of  tfje  Cfjurcij 

In  the  year  1783,  some  eight  years  after  the  first  permanent 
settlement  in  Kentucky,  there  came  into  its  bounds  the  first  minis- 
ter of  the  gospel  of  the  Presbyterian  faith  and  order.  He  came  at 
first  only  to  look  at  the  new  land  with  a  view  of  investing  in  some 
portion  of  it,  thereby  to  provide  for  his  large  and  dependent  family. 
He  came  as  did  so  many  of  the  first  Kentuckians,  from  Virginia, 
where  he  was  pastor  at  the  Peaks  of  Otter. 

The  settlers  around  Harrod's  Station,  as  it  was  at  tliat  time, 
many  of  whom  were  Presbyterians,  or  of  such  families,  asked  him 
to  come  and  be  their  pastor.  After  due  and  proper  deliberation  he 
consented,  and  moved  to  Kentucky  in  October  of  that  year,  1783. 
This  was  the  Eev.  David  Eice,  loiown  to  Presbyterian  history  in 

9 


Kentucky  as  "Father"  Eiee.  His  loneliness  as  pastor  and  evan- 
gelist was  soon  relieved  by  the  arrival  in  Kentucky  of  the  Eev. 
Adam  Kankin,  who  also  came  from  Virginia,  Augusta  County,  at 
the  call  of  the  Presbyterians  of  Lexington,  and  there  in  the  summer 
or  fall,  (authorities  differ)  organized  the  first  Presbyterian  clmrch 
under  the  name  of  ]\It.  Zion.  He  also  (his  autobiography  is  given 
as  the  authority  for  this  statement)  about  the  same  time  took 
charge  of  the  congregation  at  Pisgah,  or,  as  it  was  then  nearly 
always  called  Mount  Pisgah.  This  is  the  first  written  reference  ta 
Pisgah  that  the  writer  has  been  able  to  find,  or  to  trace.  It  will 
be  obsferved  that  it  is  not  a  record  of  the  formal  organization  of  the 
church,  and  the  implication  is  that  there  was  a  compact  body  of 
Presbyterian  people  already  in  the  neighborhood,  having  more  or 
less  coherence  of  a  religious,  if  not  an  ecclesiastical  kind.  It  is 
repeatedly  stated  by  historians  of  the  period  that  Dr.  Eice  in  his 
labors  on  the  other  side  of  the  Kentucky  river  was  hard  worked  in 
gathering  congregations,  and  in  giving  them  that  coherence  which 
seems  to  have  already  existed  among  the  people  of  Pisgah.  The 
inference  from  the  few  and  meager  historical  references  as  to  the 
virtual  existence  of  a  congregation  at  Pisgah  before  the  arrival  of 
any  minister  is  supported  by  an  uncontradicted  tradition,  which 
tells  that  very  soon  after  the  Stevenson,  Gay,  Dunlap,  and  Mcll- 
vain  families,  who  were  the  first  to  settle  in  the  Pisgah  neighbor- 
hood proper,  had  left  the  fort  in  Lexington,  and  had  completed 
their  own  log  houses  in  which  to  live,  they  built  both  a  church 
building,  and  a  scliool  house,  of  the  same  sort.  In  other  words, 
there  seems  good  ground  for  believing  that  the  origin  of  Pisgah 
church,  as  a  church,  goes  back  of  even  the  arrival  of  the  first  Presby- 
terian minister  Avho  ever  had  the  care  of  it.  x\t  any  rate,  in  the 
autumn  of  1784,  at  the  latest,  the  Eev.  Adam  Eankin  found  a  con- 
gregation awaiting  him  at  Mount  Pisgah.  It  will  be  noticed  again, 
that  the  church  in  Lexington  was  named  not  for  the  town,  indeed, 
but  Mount  Zion ;  Init  Pisgah  seems  to  have  been  named  already, 
and  by  its  church  name,  and  that  only. 

It  is  in  the  next  year  that  we  come  upon  one  of  those  brief,  but 
to  the  historian  precious,  official  references  that  for  the  instant 
gives  firm  footing  as  to  the  history  of  Pisgah  church.  It  will  be 
borne  in  nunn  that  there  was.  of  course,  no  separate  Presbytery  at 
this  time  in  all  Kentucky.  The  Presbytery  of  Hanover,  in  Virginia 
was  the  one  in  whose  bounds  this  region  was  included.     The  need 

10 


of  co-operation  and  unity  among  the  scattered,  but  increasing  con- 
gregations of  Presbyterians  being  felt,  there  was  called  a  Confer- 
ence of  representatives  from  them  all.  This  met  at  the  Cane  Run 
church,  in  what  is  now  Mercer  county,  on  the  30th  day  of  March. 
1785,  and  found  that  there  were  represented  five  congregations, 
~Tliere  were  present,  besides  the  representatives  of  the  congrega- 
tions, three  ministers,  Eev.  David  Eice,  Eev.  Adam  Eankin,  and 
Eev.  Jas.  Mitchell.  But  after  the  conference,  Mr.  Mitchell  went 
back  to  Virginia  and  succeeded  Mr.  Eice  at  the  Peaks  of  Otter. 
This  conference  had  representatives  from  Cane  Eun,  Paint  Lick. 
New  Providence,  Salem  and  Mt.  Zion,  (or  Lexington).  But  when 
it  met  again  in  July  of  the  same  year  we  find  among  the  representa- 
tives of  the  twelve  congregations  and  neighborhoods  that  had  sent 
delegates  two  from  Mount  Pisgah.  This  is  the  first  bit  of  official 
record  concerning  the  church  that  has  been  preserved  to  us,  so  far 
as  is  known  at  present.  We  have  the  names  of  the  two  men  in 
whose  persons  she  made  her  first  recorded,  and  doulDtless  her 
very  first,  appearance  in  any  ecclesiastical  assembly.  They  were 
William  Evans  and  William  Scott. 

This  conference  marks  the  beginning  of  regular  Presbyterian 
order  in  Kentucky,  and  by  the  recommendations  of  its  two  meetings 
the  churches  were  instructed  as  to  a  proper  mode  of  organization, 
and  encouraged  to  carry  it  out.  It  is  worth  while  to  look  back 
upon  that  old  meeting,  through  the  vista  of  the  years.  Let  us 
picture,  if  we  can,  the  old  log  meeting-house,  (then  not  so  old 
either),  its  rough  appointments,  its  wild  surroundings;  the  grave 
and  dignified  men  who  have  gathered  there;  the  two  ministers. 
David  Eice,  the  pious,  energetic,  practical,  forceful,  and  f arsighted : 
and  Adam  Eankin,  the  able,  restless,  fanatical,  destined  to  con- 
stantly tear  down  what  he  had  huilt  up;  and  the  delegates,  hardy 
men,  and  strong,  marked  out  from  a  time  whose  godlessness  is 
emphasized  and  deplored  by  that  very  meeting,  by  their  interests 
in  the  church  and  its  affairs.  We  know  the  names  of  them  all,  and 
it  is  perhaps  well  enough  to  record  them  again  here.  There  were 
Wm.  Maxwell  and  Jno.  Todd,  from  Jessamine  Creek;  Henry  Mc- 
Donald and  Thos.  Cavin,  from  Walnut  Hill;  Jno.  McConnell  and 
David  Logan,  from  Mt,  Zion  (Lexington) ;  Thos.  Maxwell,  from 
Paint  Lick;  Jacob  Fishback  and  Andrew  Elders,  from  the  forks  of 
Dick's  Eiver;  Eobert  Caldwell  and  Samuel  McDowell,  from  Con- 
cord   (Danville)  ;  Jno.   Templin  and  Caleb  Wallace,  from  Cane 

11 


Kun;  Jas.  McCoun  and  Geo.  Buchannan^  from  New  Providence; 
Geo.  Pomeroy  and  Jno.  Veecli,  from  Hopewell;  Jas.  Beard  and 
Jas.  Allen,  from  Salem;  Jas.  Davies  and  Jno.  Snoddy,  from  Whit- 
ley's Station  and  Crab  Orchard,  and  our  owti  representatives  from 
I'isgah.  Besides  these,  there  were  two  men  destined  to  play  no 
small  part  as  diligent  ministers  of  the  Word  in  this  Western 
Country,  who  were  present  as  probationers  for  the  ministry,  but 
not  yet  ordained.  They  were  -las.  Crawford  and  Terah  Templin. 
^^'e  can  see  them  all  there,  met  in  solemn  session  on  that  far-off 
Tuesday  in  the  warm  July  weather,  listening  to  the  opening  sermon 
of  Mr.  Pice  from  the  text,  "For  Zion's  sake  I  will  not  hold  my 
peace,  and  for  Jerusalem's  sake  I  will  not  rest  until  the  righteous- 
ness thereof  go  fortli  as  brightness,  and  the  salvation  thereof  as  a 
lamp  that  burneth."     Isaiah,  62:1. 

They  had  come  over  the  mud  roads  and  along  the  wilderness 
trails  (fairly  good  as  highways  no  doubt  just  at  this  midsummer 
season,  which  is  indicated  also  by  the  large  attendance)  through 
the  lonely,  gigantic  forest  of  which  a  modern  Kentucky  writer  has 
said  that  the  world  will  not  look  upon  the  like  of  it  again,  besides 
the  deep  cane  brakes,  fording  the  creeks  and  the  River  whose 
solemn  grey  cliffs  look  down  upon  us,  as  unresponsive  and  unmoved 
by  our  swift  crossing  on  the  bridge  that  unites  their  lofty  fronts 
as  they  did  upon  the  slow  and  painful  passage  of  the  men  of  the 
Cane  Eun  Conference.  They  had  made  the  journey  on  horseback, 
with  their  saddle  bags  and  haversacks.  It  is  not  a  very  smft,  or 
easy  trip.  But  it  was  worth  while.  And  we  are  thankful  that 
among  them  were  Wm.  Evans  and  Wm.  Scott,  of  Mt.  Pisgah. 

In  the  next  3'ear  one  of  the  larger  and  more  tangible  results  of 
this  conference  appears.  For  the  new  Presbytery  is  organized  at  its 
instance,  at  Danville,  in  the  eourt_house  there,  on  Tuesday,  October 
17th,  1786.  The  names  of  the  elders  present  are  given  in  the 
minutes  of  that  meeting,  but  not  the  churches  from  which  they 
came.  It  has  not  been  possible  for  the  writer  to  identify  the 
churches  by  the  names  of  the  men,  and  therefore  it  cannot  be  stated 
with  certainty  that  Pisgah  was  represented  there  by  a  ruling  elder. 
Her  pastor,  however,  the  Rev.  Adam  Rankin,  was  there. 

Within  eighteen  months  Pisgah  began  to  figure  at  least  a  little 
in  the  business  of  the  Presbytery.  For  at  the  spring  meeting  in 
1788  a  commission  was  appointed  to  determine  the  bounds  of  the 
congi-egation  of  Bethel  church,  and  those  under  the  care  of  Mr. 

\2 


Eankin.  It  will  be  remembered  that  on  one  side  the  Mt.  Zion  con- 
gregation at  Lexington,  and  on  the  other,  that  of  Pisgah  touched 
the  territory  of  Bethel.  This  matter  seems  to  have  been  amicably 
disposed  of.  But  not  long  afterwards,  the  Presbytery  finds  itself  at 
its  fourth  regular  meeting,  obliged  to  hear  an  appeal  of  "Elder 
Wni.  Scott,"  of  Pisgah,  who  had  been  suspended  from  the  commun- 
ion of  the  church  by  the  session  of  which  he  was  a  member.  His 
offense  was  that  he  had  often  invited  Baptist  ministers,  and  on  one 
occasion  had  permitted  a  Methodist  minister  to  preach  in  his  own 
house.  Mr.  Scott  now  appeals  to  the  Presbytery  against  this 
decision  of  his  fellow  elders  at  Pisgah.  Presbytery  takes  the  matter 
•under  grave  andT deliberate  consideration,  and  decides  against  the 
session,  and,  in  favor  of  Mr.  Scott,  restoring  him  to  his  church 
privileges.  But  Presbytery  receives  notice  from  Mr.  Scott's  pastor, 
Eev.  Adam  Eankin,  that  the  matter  will  not  be  suffered  to  rest 
here,  and  that  he  will  appeal  to  Synod,  the  Presbytery  judging 
however,  that  an  appeal  in  the  case  would  be  irregular.  Through 
this  incident  we  may  indeed  get  a  view  of  the  smallness  and  bitter- 
ness that  could  appear  even  in  religious  matters,  and  the  exhibition 
by  able  and  earnest  men;  but  at  the  same  time  there  is  given  in 
bold  relief  the  true  character  of  the  Presbytery  as  a  liberal  body  by 
its  high-minded  and  just  decision.  But  afterwards  Mr.  Scott  ap- 
pears as  an  elder  from  Clear  Creek  church,  and  not  of  Pisgah. 

In  the  meantime  there  is  a  most  commendable  interest  being 
manifested  by  the  ministers  at  least,  in  the  work  of  home  missions. 
And  at  the  meeting  of  Transylvania  Presbytery  in  October,  1790, 
a  collection  for  this  purpose  is  called  for  in  all  the  congregations, 
and  special  persons  are  appoinic  1  in  each  one  to  collect  the  funds. 
We  have  all  the  names  and  their  locations  preserved  to  us  in  the 
records  of  the  Presbytery.  The  collector  appointed  for  Pisgah  was 
Moses  Mcllvain.  It  is  in  April,  1791  that  Pisgah  again  attracts 
special  attention  on  the  floor  of  Presbytery.  It  is  recorded  that  a 
petition  was  then  presented  to  the  Presbytery  from  a  number  of 
persons  in  the  Pisgah  congregation  requesting  that  they  be  relieved  ;- 
of  the  pastoral  care  of  the  Eev.  Adam  Eankin.  The  Presbytery 
found  upon  investigation  that  is  was  not  sufficiently  informed  of 
the  circumstances  to  act  finally  on  the  matter,  and  ordered  an 
adjourned  meeting  at  Pisgah  itself  to  hear  the  whole  case.  And  so, 
they  met  again  on  the  third  Tuesday  of  May,  the  very  next  month. 
Thus  Pisgah  had  its  first  meeting  of  the  Presbytery.    jS^ow,  when  it 

13 


met  in  the  fragrance  and  beauty  of  the  mid-May  weather  in  the  old 
log  church  under  the  shadow  of  the  mighty  forest,  there  appeared 
at  the  session  a  man  not  seen  at  this  Presbytery  before.  He  is  a 
young  licentiate  of  a  North  Carolina  Presbytery,  and  he  comes  with 
the  proper  credentials,  asking  permission  to  labor  in  the  bounds  of 
Transylvania,  which  before  the  adjournment  is  "most  cheerfully 
granted."  He  it  is  who  preaches,  the  opening  sermon  here  at 
Pisgah,  his  text  being,  "For  thus  saith  the  Lord  God;  Behold  I, 
even  I,  will  both  search  my  sheep,  and  seek  them  out."  Ezekiel, 
34:11.  This  young  man  was  James  Blythe.  After  this  sermon 
they  "endeavored  to  get  the  mind  of  the  people,"  and  failing  to  do 
so  at  that  sitting  adjourned  until  the  next  day.  And  finally  before* 
leaving  Pisgah  they  came  to  the  conclusion  that  since  it  appeared 
that  the  pastor  of  Pisgah,  Rev.  Adam  Rankin,  had  been  absent  for 
more  than  a  year,  without  arrangement  having  been  made"  for  the  j 
supply  of  his  place^,  the  church  should  have  permission  for  the  time  / 
being  to  ask  Presbytery  to  furnish  supplies  to  its  pulpit.  The  \ 
licentiate  who  had  just  come  among  them  was  appointed  to  do  this 
for  the  present,  and  also  to  supply  at  Lexington,  the  other  part  of 
Mr.  Rankin's  field  left  unprovided  for  by  his  absence.  And  thus 
began  that  "connection  of  forty  years"  to  which  reference  is  made 
in  tlie  sermon  with  which,  in  1832,  Dr.  Blythe  bade  farewell  to  the 
Pisgah  people.  Mr.  Rankin  was  still  pastor.  Bl3'^the  was  a  supply. 
And  even  now  he  was  to  preach  but  one  Sunday  in  a  month.  Mr. 
Crawford  of  Walnut  Hill,  and  Mr.  Shannon,  of  Bethel,  were  each 
to  supply  one  Sunday. 

And  it  is  a  fact  that  not  only  Pisgah,  but  apparently  nearly,  if 
not  quite  all,  of  the  churches  were  supplied  in  this  fashion,  few,  if 
any  having  service  by  the  same  minister  every  Sunday  in  the 
month.  At  the  successive  meetings  of  Presbytery  Pisgah  presents 
her  formal  request  for  supplies,  until  in  April,  1702,  when  Adam 
Rankin,  now  returned  from  Europe  where  he  had  been  for  some  - 
two  vears,  is  brought  to  trial  under  charges  long  pending  against 
him  in  the  Presbytery.  These  grew  out  of  Mr.  Rankin's  fanaticism. 
He  believed  that  it  was  wrong  to  use  in  public  worship  any  kind 
of  hymns  except  _psalms,  and  that  Watt's  hymns  were  especially 
unallowable.  He  undertook  to  excommunicate  persons  who  dis- 
agreed with  him.  Besides  this  he  was  convinced  that  he  received 
divine  guidance  through  dreams.  The  discussion  precipitated  tlie 
question  of  his  veracity.     In  the  long  run,  he  was  first  censured. 

14 


and  then,  when  he  publicly  renounced  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Pres- 
bytery and  proceeded  on  his  own  way,  collecting  followers  around 
him,  he  was  formally  deposed  from  the  Presbyterian  ministry,  and 
his  charges  declared  vacant.     This  was  in  October  1793. 

On  June  12th,  1793,  we  find  Presbytery  in  session  at  Bethel 
church,  where  a  call  for  the  services  of  licentiate  Jas.  Blythe,  as 
regular  pastor  was  presented  by  the  Clear  Creek  church  and  by  the 
Pisgah  Church,  the  service  to  be  rendered  to  both  churches.  The 
exercises  connected  with  his  ordination  and  installation  were 
entered  upon  at  Clear  Creek  at  a  special  meeting  of  the  Presbytery 
on  July  25th,  1793,  and  continued  at  Pisgah  at  2  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon  of  the  27th. 

Just  how  long  this  joint  arrangement  between  these  neighbor- 
ing congregations  was  in  effect  the  writer  has  not  been  able  to 
determine.  But  the  Clear  Chreek  church  no  longer  exists  as  a 
separate  congregation.  Twice  after  this  Pisgah  shared  her  pastor 
with  a  neighbor,  when  for  a  short  time  Dr.  Douglas  served  Mt. 
Sterling  as  well  as  Pisgah,  and  afterwards  divided  each  Sunday 
between  Pisgah  and  Bethel.  With  the  exceptions  of  Mr.  Eankin's 
joint  supply  of  Lexington  and  Pisgah,  Dr.  Blythe's  service  at  Clear 
Creek,  and  the  arrangement  with  Dr.  Douglas  just  mentioned, 
Pisgah  has  had  the  full  possession  of  her  pastors. 

In  the  following  year,  1794,  the  Presbytery  in  its  regular  spring 
meeting  at  Woodford  church,  not  far  from  Pisgah,  took  an  action  that 
increased  the  importance  of  Pisgah  as  a  pastoral  charge,  and  at  the 
same  time  indicated  the  estimate  in  which  the  neighborhood  was 
already  held.  It  then  and  there  determined  to  establish  a  gram- 
mar school  under  its  own  care.  Elaborate  plans  were  made  for  its 
•operation.  Pisgah  was  chosen  as  its  location.  A  part  of  the  plan 
was  the  support  of  needy  students.  Men  were  appointed  through- 
out the  Presbytery  to  collect  funds.  At  Pisgah  the  collector  was 
again  Moses  Mcllvain.  An  account  of  this  institution  is  given 
below  in  the  '^Story  of  the  School." 

The  first  regular  meeting  of  the  Presbytery  at  Pisgah  for 
ordinary  routine  business  was  that  of  October  6th,  1795.  No  doubt 
the  opening  of  the  new  Grammar  School  had  something  to  do  with 
determining  the  choice  of  Pisgah  as  the  meeting  place.  In  1796 
when  Presbytery  is  in  session  in  its  fall  meeting,  at  the  town  of 
Paris,  a  committee  is  appointed  to  visit  and  "examine  the  Gram- 
mar School  at  Pisgah."     This  committee  was  made  up  of  Rev.  R. 

15 


Marsliall,  Eev.  Jas.  Blythe,  and  Eev.  Jas.  Welch.  In  1799,  in  the 
spring  of  that  year — Pisgah,  without  moving  its  location,  found 
itself  within  the  bounds  of  another  Presbytery.  For  the  Presby- 
tery of  Transylvania  was  divided,  and  Pisgah  fell  in  the  bounds  of 
West  Lexington,  of  which  she  has  ever  since  been  a  part.  And  in 
1802  the  Sj^nod  of  Virginia  parts  with  tliese  Western  Presbyteries, 
and  Pisgah  is  in  the  new  Synod  of  Kentucky.  The  older  records 
of  this  Presbytery  never  show  what  churches  were  represented  at 
the  meetings,  although  the  names  of  the  ruling  elders,  as  well  as 
of  the  ministers,  are  always  given.  But  judging  from  the  known 
fact  of  the  importance  of  Pisgah  in  the  church  organization  of  the 
day,  the  prominence  and  influence  of  her  pastor.  Dr.  Blythe,  and 
the  appearance  of  certain  names  on  the  roll  of  Presbytery  that  we 
recognize  as  those  of  Pisgah  families,  it  is  fair  to  conclude  that 
the  church  was  represented  with  tolerable  regularity  at  the  sessions 
of  the  church  courts.  When  we  come  to  the  year  1808  we  open 
Pisgah's  own  record.  It  is  doubtful  that  a  church  book  was  kept 
before  that  date.  For  there  is  nothing  in  the  record  of  Presbytery 
to  show  that  it  required  in  the  very  early  times  any  such  thing,  as 
it  does  now.  And  besides  that,  the  opening  statement  of  the  clerk 
who  prepared  the  book  beginning  with  the  year  1808  is  such  as  to 
at  least  imply  that  there  was  no  previous  record  accessible  to  him. 
Indeed  he  alluded  in  no  way  to  any  other.  But  whatever  may  have 
been  the  requirement  of  Presbytery  at  the  first  we  know  that  the 
books  of  the  churches  had  to  be  before  that  body  at  least  as  early 
as  1809.  For  on  October  10th,  1809,  the  record  shows  that  Pisgah's 
book  was  before  Presbytery,  which  was  meeting  in  regular  session, 
in  the  fair  fall  weather  at  Pisgah  itself.  We  find  that  the  early 
custom  at  the  communion  services,  record  of  which  is  carefully 
preserved,  was  that  the  pastor  was  assisted  by  one  or  more  ministers. 
We  are  also  told  by  historians  that  these  services  were  long  and 
tedious,  the  people  were  served  at  tables  in  relays,  an  exhortation 
being  given  to  each  table  as  it  was  seated,  and  that  somtimes  the 
sun  would  be  going  down  over  tlie  tall  tree  tops  as  a  Presbyterian 
congregation  would  be  filing  away  through  the  wooded  lands  from 
their  all  day  worship.  And  besides  this,  before  there  was  any 
actual  communion  service,  the  tables,  as  we  are  told,  were  always 
carefully  "fenced  ;"  that  is  to  say  a  long  and  elaborate  warning  was 
proclaimed  by  the  minister  against  the  unworthy  eating  and  drink- 
ing of  the  bread  and  the  cup. 

16 


Moreover  the  young  people  were  never  expected  to,  and  seldom 
did,  partake  of  the  communion.  There  was,  liowever,  a  custom 
(which  Dr.  Blyth  at  least  followed)  of  meeting  the  young  people, 
and  sometimes  the  whole  congregation,  and  asking  them  questions 
as  to  doctrine  at  least,  and  probably  as  to  experience  also.  While 
Dr.  Blythe  was  serving  as  Pisgah's  pastor  he  was  elected,  and  served 
as  professor  in  Transylvania  University,  acting  for  a  while  as  its 
President.  This  meant  that  he  lived  in  Lexington.  He  came  out 
over  the  roads  through  the  long  years  to  meet  his  regular  appoint- 
ments at  the  church.  And  when  he  came  one  day  in  his  two- 
wheeled  gig  tradition  declares  that  the  whole  country  side  was 
excited  with  admiration  and  wonder,  for  it  was  the  first  wheeled 
vehicle  for  human  travel  ever  seen  in  that  locality.  We  do  not 
know  what  was  the  success  of  Mr.  Moses  Mcllvain  in  collecting 
either  the  home  mission  funds,  or  those  for  needy  students,  Avhich 
he  was  appointed  to  receive  from  the  Pisgah  people,  but  in  1810  we 
read  that  the  church  promised  Dr.  Blythe  a  salary  of  $130,  and 
was  in  arrears;  an.d  in  1S19  we  find  the  first  recorded  collection 
to  be  $10.00,  for  expenses  of  the  Commissioners  of  the  Presbytery 
to  the  General  Assembly,  and  after  that  the  next  record  of  the  kind 
is  that  in  1820  the  church  contributed  $20.00  to  the  contingent 
fund  of  the  theological  seminary  at  Princeton,  New  Jersey. 

An  event  of  importarce  in  the  life  of  the  church  is  the  erection 
of  its  second,  and  permanent,  house  of  worship.  In  1812,  a  little 
further  up  the  slope  than  the  site  oi  the  log  building,  they  placed 
their  stone  house,  bare  and  grim  prhaps,  but  beautifully  placed, 
and  standing  as  was  fit  in  those  times  of  war,  like  a  fortress,  "four 
square  to  all  the  winds  that  blow." 

Although  Dr.  Blythe  lived  in  Lexington  and  was  a  man  of 
varied  occupation,  editing  a  magazine  in  addition  to  his  work  in 
the  college,  and  the  organized  life  of  the  church  must  have  suffered 
thereby,  yet  we  find  that  it  prospered  in  a  very  real  way.  For 
instance,  in  the  church  year  1827-1828  there  was  a  revival  in 
Pisgah  resulting  in  seventy-seven  additions,  seventy-six  of  them 
by  examination,  more  than  doubling  the  membership  of  the  church. 
It  was  either  in  1827  or  1828  that  Pisgah's  Sunday  School  was 
organized.  The  tradition  is  that  a  library  was  gotten  at  the  begin- 
ning, and  the  first  librarian  was  J.  Watson  Mcllvain,  who  only 
within  the  last  few  years  fell  asleep  to  rest  beneath  the  sod  of  the 

17 


yard  of  the  church,  within  whose  portals  he  had  been  baptized  as 
an  infant,  and  which  his  grand-father  had  helped  to  found. 

Thus  the  smooth  current  of  this  peaceful  history  of  a  country 
church  flows  onward ,  with  its  sermons,  communion  seasons, 
baptisms,  marriages,  and  funerals,  showing  in  its  records  at  least, 
little,  if  any,  trace  of  the  religious,  theological  and  ecclesiastical 
storms  that  raged  in  Kentucky  in  the  early  years  of  the  last  century. 
That  movement  which  resulted  in  the  formation  of  the 
Cumberland  Presbyterian  church,  does  not  appear  to  have  affected 
Pisgah  at  all.  And  it  is  altogether  probable  that  this  appearance 
is  in  accord  with  the  actual  facts.  For  that  movement  had  its 
center  in  the  western  portion  of  the  state,  and  while  it  did  have 
effect  in  central  Kentucky,  founding  churches  in  the  vicinity  of 
Danville,  for  instance,  yet  its  main  currents  set  in  other  directions. 
Neither  do  the  excitement  and  agitation  which  led  to  the  formation 
of  the  congregations  following  the  leadership  of  Barton  Stone 
during  this  same  time  appear  to  have  seriously  disturbed  Pisgah; 
although  one  of  the  great  meetings  connected  with  this  movement 
was  held  at  the  neighl)oring  church  of  Bethel,  and  the  pastor  of 
that  church,  Eev.  E.  Marshall,  was  so  prominent  in  the  movement, 
then  called  by  the  name  of  "The  New  Light,"  that  the  people  iden- 
tified with  it  were  of  spoken  as  "Marshall  ites."  The  Shakers  also 
at  this  time  made  incursions  into  Kentucky,  and  carried  away 
from  this  very  region  the  ministers  Houston  and  Dunlavy,  besides 
not  a  few  families.  But  this  heresj''  likewise  failed  to  find  any 
victims  among  the  people  of  Pisgah.  The  immunity  of  this  church 
from  lasting  injury  through  tliese  serious  disorders  tliat  were 
effecting  every  denomination,  and  almost  every  neighborhood,  west 
of  the  Alleghanies,  may  be  traced  in  part  at  least  to  the  fact  that 
very  early  in  this  period  of  disorder  the  Presbytery  of  West  Lex- 
ington took  special  precautions  in  the  instruction  of  the  people 
and  in  demanding  a  certain  standard  of  orthodoxy  from  applicants 
for  ordination;  that  from  among  a  Presbyterian  ministry  in  the 
State  of  a  lower  average  in  equipment  and  native  ability  than  tliat 
of  the  same  ministry  in  tlie  older  parts  of  the  country,  her  pastor, 
Dr.  Bl\'ihe,  ^tood  out  with  but  one  or  two  others,  a  man  of  com- 
manding ability  and  large  furnishing,  his  influence  and  guidance, 
both  in  his  own  congregation  and  in  the  church  assemblies  being 
against  the  extravagances,  disorders  and  errors  of  the  time;  and, 
finally,  that  at  Pisgah  none  of  the  disorderly  and  exciting  camp 

18 


meetings  of  the  era  were  ever  held.  Ultimately,  but  pro'bably  at  a 
later  period,  when  the  followers  of  Barton  Stone  were  merged  in 
the  movement  to  which  Alexander  Campbell  gave  such  able  direc- 
tion, Pisgah  did  suffer  losses.  And  in  certain  congregations  of  the 
Christian  denomination  in  Central  Kentucky  may  be  found  today 
some  of  the  descendants  of  Pisgah's  founders;  for  instance,  the 
Dunlaps,  some  of  the  Gays,  and  Steeles,  not  a  few  of  whom  live 
on  their  ancestral  lands  within  the  domain  of  the  church  of  their 
fathers,  the  churches  of  which  they  are  today  a  part  being  only  the 
stronger  and  better  for  their  membership  in  them.  But  during  all 
the  period  of  the  first  two  decades  of  last  century  Pisgah  seems  to 
have  become  more  thoroughly  organized  and  more  vigorous  as  a 
church  of  the  Presbyterian  order. 

In  1S38  occurred  an  event  which  marked  an  epoch  in  Pisgah's 
history.  For  forty  years,  either  as  stated  supply  or  as  pastor,  for 
more  or  for  less  of  his  time,  but  imbrokenly  for  all  that  period, 
Jas.  Blythe  had  served  her  with  distinguished  ability.  We  would 
have  thought  his  life  already  well-nigh  spent.  Here  he  had  lived 
it,  had  reared  his  family,  had  seen  a  favorite  son  go  forth  -with 
hundreds  of  others  of  the  best  blood  in  Kentucky  to  the  War  of 
1812,  to  meet  death  at  the  River  Raisin,  and  here  he  was  now  already 
an  old  man.  But  he  is  called  to  the  Presidency  of  Hanover  College 
in  Indiana,  and  with  the  same  spirit  which  prompted  him  as  a  youth 
to  heed  the  call  of  the  "West  still  strong  within  him,  he  accepted  this 
invitation  to  the  yet  newer  West.  In  the  fall  of  1832  he  preached 
his  famous  farewell  sermon  to  his  devoted  parishioners  at  Pisgah. 
We  do  not  have  any  record  of  his  having  received  a  higher  salary 
than  the  $130.00  of  1830,  but  we  may  at  least  be  permitted  to  hope 
that  a  part  of  Pisgah^s  unrecorded  improvement  was  a  greater  gen- 
erosity in  this  respect  before  the  close  of  his  pastorate. 

Pisgah's  third  pastor  was  the  Rev.  Joseph  Cunningham,  of  the 
Synod  of  Alabama,  a  call  for  whose  services  was  placed  in  his  hands 
by  West  Lexington  Presbytery  September  7,  1832,  which  he  ac- 
cepted. His  installation  took  place  in  the  spring  of  1833.  But  his 
health  failed  rapidly,  and  he  was  released  from  the  care  of  the 
church  in  September  of  the  same  year.  For  long  his  body  rested 
in  Pisgah  church-yard,  but  in  recent  years  was  removed  by  his 
daughter,  Mrs.  Freeman,  to  St.  Louis,  Mo.  Brief  as  was  Mr.  Cun- 
ningham's pastorate,  there  are  evidences  that  he  was  undertaking 
his  work  with  energy  and  system.    In  any  long  pastorate,  especially 

19 


one  of  the  kind  that  Dr.  Blythe's  was,  it  nearly  always  happens 
that  the  routine  business  of  the  congregation  falls  into  more  or  less 
irregularity  and  confusion,  however  perfect  the  work  may  be  in 
other  re?])ects.  Mr.  Cunningham  is  evidently  bent  upon  thorough 
organization.  He  is  apparently  living  among  the  people,  which 
Dr.  Blvthe  had  not  done,  and  has  evidently  induced  the  session  to 
appoint — a?  the  records  show  it  did  appoint — a  committee  to  find 
out  the  number  of  members  ''in  regiilar  communion  in  this  church." 
This  was  done  in  January,  1833.  On  March  30,  the  committee 
reports  the  membership,  not  130,  as  their  last  report  to  Presbytery 
in  the  year  before  had  shown,  but  80,  which  is  given  as  the  approx- 
imate membership.  ^ 

On  Friday,  November  22,  1833,  the  congregation  is  in  special 
session,  under  either  the  grey  skies  of  lute  autumn  or  in  the  hazy 
beauty  of  Indian  summer,  whichever  the  month  of  November 
brought  that  year,  Eev.  Nathan  H.  Hall  acting  as  Moderator  by 
request  of  the  people.  The  object  of  the  meeting  is  to  call  a 
pastor.  The  name  of  the  Eev.  Jacob  F.  Price  is  proposed.  He  re- 
ceives a  unanimous  vote.  A  formal  call  is  made  out  and  signed  by 
the  elders.  The  amount  of  salary  is  specified  therein,  being  the 
sum  of  ^loO.  That  promised  to  Mr.  Cunningham  is  not  a  matter 
of  record.  This  call  was  to  have  been  presented  at  the  next  spring 
meeting  of  the  Presbytery. 

But  it  was  not  until  the  fall  meeting — September  24,  1834 — 
that  it  was  actually  before  the  Presbytery.  And  Mr.  Price  was  not 
installed  until  five  years  later,  serving  the  church  meanwhile  as 
stated  supply,  or  pastor-elect.  Mr.  Price  was  the  only  native  Ken- 
tuckian  to  serve  the  church  as  pastor  from  1784  to  1897.  He  was 
a  native  of  Clark  County,  and  from  the  records  of  the  church, 
seems  to  have  been  a  man  of  energy  and  force.  He,  too,  lives  with 
the  people.  He  is  diligent  in  preaching,  often  having  afternoon 
services  at  some  private  house.  Collections  are  more  frequent; 
communion  services  grow  more  regular.  There  are  also  cases  of 
discipline,  and  the  meetings  of  session  are  frequent  and  filled  with 
business.  He  is  careful  also  about  church  records,  and  he  himself 
is  clerk  of  session  after  the  death  of  Nathaniel  Ferguson,  who,  after 
having  served  as  clerk  from  the  beginning  of  the  year  1808,  wrote 
his  last  minute  September  4,  1836,  and  entered  into  rest  on  the 
21st  of  the  same  month.  It  was  during  the  pastorate  of  Mr.  Price 
that  there  was  held  in  the  grove  that  then  stood  across  the  road 

20 


from  the  church  the  great  camp-meeting.  It  was  in  1841.  It  be- 
gan on  the  twenty-third  of  September  and  continued  until  the  after- 
noon of  October  the  fourth.  Twenty-one  tents  were  pitched  for  the 
worshipers,  and  throughout  the  lovely  autumn  days  and  soft, 
though  cool,  nights,  the  preaching  went  on.  The  ministers  assist- 
ing in  it  at  different  times  were  Robert  J.  Breckinridge,  W.  Y. 
Allen,  N.  I..  Rice,  N.  H.  Hall,  J.  G.  General,  J.  H.  Logan,  Wm.  L. 
Breckinridge,  Jno.  F.  Coons,  J.  J.  Bullock,  R.  Davidson,  J.  D.  Mat- 
thews, J.  Lyle,  Wm.  R.  Preston,  G.  W.  McElroy,  C.  Stuart,  J.  C. 
Harrison,  J.  K.  Burch.  There  were  fift3'-six  additions  to  the! 
churches  of  the  vicinity,  as  follows :  Bethel,  4 ;  Woodford,  5 ;  and 
Pisgah,  47.  There  has  been  a  vast  change  since  the  wild  meetings 
of  forty  years,  or  even  thirty  years  before.  Much  more  numerou^ 
are  the  able  and  effective  ministers,  much  higher  the  tone  of  preach- 
ing, very  different  the  staid,  orderly  crowds  from  the  noisy  congre- 
gations of  the  older  time,  and  very  different  also  the  results  from 
those  of  the  meetings  of  the  "Great  Revival."  This  was  the  first 
and  only  camp-meeting  ever  held  at  Pisgah.  This  was  also  the  period 
of  another  religious  controversy.  The  Old  School  and  New  School 
were  battling  within  the  ever  dividing,  yet,  always  unified,  field  of 
Presbyterianism.  Some  churches  divided.  Pisgah  church  was,  of 
course,  affected  by  the  controversy.  But  once  more  there  was  no 
great  injury.  It  did  not  "split."  Mr.  Price  and  his  session  were 
Old  School,  as  were  the  most  of  the  congregation.  The  strife 
seems  to  have  been  here  reduced  to  a  minimum,  although  it  does 
not  appear  that  the  pastor  was  a  man  to  compromise  even  for  the 
sake  of  peace. 

In  IS  J  7  the  General  Assembly  met  in  Richmond,  Va.  There 
was  no  train  of  sleepers  and  diners  taking  us  through  the  Cumber- 
lands  and  over  the  Blue  Ridge  in  a  certain  number  of  hours.  The 
telegraph  had  only  a  year  or  two  before  carried  its  first  item  of 
news  when  it  had  announced  the  election  of  James  K.  Polk  to  the 
Presidency.  One  of  the  commissioners  to  the  General  Assembly  was 
Pisgah's  pastor.  The  session  was  over  and  they  were  coming  home, 
he  and  Dr.  J.  J.  Bullock,  in  the  creaking,  toiling  stage  coach,  when 
suddenly  Mr.  Price  was  stricken.  And  there  he  died,  his  traveling 
companion  and  fellow  presbyter  bringing  his  body  home  to  Pisgah. 
There  Dr.  Bullock  conducted  the  funeral  in  the  presence  of  a  large 
congregation.    And  there  stands  today,  in  the  church-yard,  a  taste- 

21 


ful  monument  erected  by  the  congregation,  above  the  dust  of  their 
faithful,  laborioui^i  and  efficient  pastor. 

Dr.  Price  had  died  on  June  3,  1847.  His  burial  took  place  on 
Sabbath  evening,  June  6th,  and  on  the  next  day  Dr.  Bullock 
preached  the  funeral,  the  text  being  the  first  four  verses  of  the 
fourteenth  chapter  of  John's  gospel. 

The  weeks  slip  by,  and  there  is  no  permanent  provision  for  the 
supply  of  Pisgah's  pulpit,  though  the  services  seem  to  have  been 
provided  at  least  with  tolerable  regularity.  But  on  Friday,  August 
"^Oth,  of  that  same  year,  there  begins  in  this  vacant  church  a  series 
of  services  preparatory  to  communion.  They  continued  until  Sep- 
tember 6th.  Rev.  David  S.  Tod  was  present  all  the  time,  and  acted 
as  Moderator.  Others  assisted  at  various  times.  Among  them  Eev. 
S.  M.  Bayless.  There  were  during  these  meetings  forty-three  ad- 
ditions, forty-two  by  examination.  On  September  7th,  Rev.  S.  M. 
Bayless  is  asked  by  the  congregation  to  become  their  stated  supply 
until  January  1st,  1848.  This  arrangement  is  effected,  and  on 
January  2d  the  congregation  elect  Mr.  Bayless  pastor.  In  Feb- 
ruary of  that  year,  on  the  24th,  Presbytery  meets  in  called  session 
at  Pisgah.  The  call  from  the  church  is  placed  in  the  hands  of  Mr. 
Bayless.  He  accepts.  The  salary  promised  in  the  call  is  $550 
(note  the  advance),  and  on  that  winter  day  the  Presbytery  pro- 
ceeds to  ordain  and  install  Pisgah's  fifth  pastor.  It  is  while  Mr. 
Bayless  is  acting  as  stated  supply  that  on  January  8,  1848,  Pisgah 
elects  her  first  trustees.  They  are  the  elders  of  the  church,  who 
happen  at  that  time  to  be  Wm.  Allen,  Jno.  Neet,  Jno:  Martin  and 
Jas.  Berryman. 

In  July,  1851,  there  died  a  devoted  member  of  the  Pisgah 
church.  He  gave  to  the  church,  in  addition  to  the  original  two 
acres  given  for  the  site  by  his  father  and  mother,  Samuel  and  Jane 
Stevenson,  the  pioneers,  a  tract  of  thirty  acres  for  a  parsonage. 
In  grateful  recognition  of  the  generosity  of  this  original  Pisgah 
family,  the  congregation,  on  the  recommendation  of  the  session,  by 
voluntary  contributions,  erect  a  monument  in  the  church  yard, 
which  perpetuates  the  memory  of  these  donors  to  this  day.  This 
was  done  soon  after  the  death  of  Robert  Stevenson,  the  action  of 
the  session  being  on  August  27,  1851.  In  the  following  spring  Mr. 
Bayless  resigns,  removing  to  Indiana,  from  which  state  he  had  come. 
In  the  meantime,  he  had  married  Miss  Bettie  Milton,  a  daughter  of 
one  of  Pisffah's  families.     This  pastorate  seems  marked  by  a  busy 

22 


development  in  the  life  of  the  congregation.  There  are  the  same 
important  meetings  of  session  as  in  the  pastorate  of  Mr.  Price,  and 
every  evidence  of  an  increasing  system,  order  and  force.  Mr.  Bay- 
less  died  in  Indiana  some  time  after  his  removal  from  Kentucky. 

Fronj    about   this   time  nntil   the   following  spring  the  regular 
stated  supply  of  this  church  is  Eev.  W.  C.  McPheeters,  who  also 
became  a  member  of  the  church  upon  examination,  being  so  received, 
according  to  the  records  of  the  church,  on  March  6,  1853.     It  is 
just  here,  and  during  a  vacancy  in  the  church  that  we  come  upon 
the  first  recorded  election  of  deacons.    It  is  on  March  13,  1853. 
Jas.  Gay  and  Jno.  Valentine  were  chosen.    But  the  record  is  made 
as  if  it  were  not  a  new  thing.     The  language  used  is  the  same  as 
that  in  which  the  election  of  elders,  held  at  the  same  time,  is  re- 
corded.    The  record  compiled  by  Dr.  Hart,  to  which  reference  is 
constantly  made  for  this  part  of  the  church's  history,  states  that 
deacons  were  known  to  have  served  earlier  than  this,  and  gives  the 
names  of  certain  of  them.     There  were  none,  however,  in  1808 — 
unless  there  has  been  a  great  oversight  on  the  part  of  the  clerk  of 
session  in  those  days,  who  compiled  and  recorded  a  list  of  all  the 
members  and  otlicers  of  the  church,  and  of  the  families  connected 
with  the  congregation.     It  must  be  remembered  also  that  the  office 
of  deacon  was  not  fully  developed  in  our  churches  until  modern 
days.     Many  Presbyterian  churches,  both  in  Scotland  and  in  this 
country,  have  not  considered  the  office  necessary,  and  have  had  no 
deacons.     Xot  only  does  Pisgah  elect  new  deacons  while  the  pas- 
torate is  vacant,  but  at  that  same  meeting,  with  the  spring  weather 
upon  them,  and  all  the  pressure  of  the  season's  work,  they  appoint 
a  committee  with  full  power  to  proceed  with  the  building  of  a  par- 
sonage.   This  is  to  be,  of  course,  on  the  thirty  acres  given  them  by 
Eobert  Stevenson,  and  immediately  adjoining  the  grounds  of  the 
church.     This  committee  was  composed  of  Dr.  R.  H.  Wason,  Jno. 
N"eet,  Wm.  Allen,  Jno.  Valentine  and  Jas.  Gay.     There  is  no  re- 
corded   report    of    this    committee.     But  that  their  duty  was  per- 
formed is  witnessed  by  the  parsonage  itself  and  the  memory  of  Pis- 
gah.   Back  of  a  pasture  of  blue  grass,  which  still  retains  the  char- 
acter of  a  woodland,  though  many  of  the  ancient  trees  that  saw 
the  laying  of  tlie  foundation  of  the  minister's  dwelling  have  since 
fallen,  nnd  looking  out  through  a  vista  of  trees  toward  the  turn- 
pike, stands  today  the  same  commodious  dwelling  that  the  dili- 
gence of  this  comm-ittee,  the  pious  generosity  of  Eobert  Stevenson, 

23 


and  the  kindl\-  interest  of  the  congregation  made  possible  a  half 
century  ago.  It  has  been  added  to  and  improved,  from  time  to 
time,  but  the  original  building,  which  is  the  entire  front  of  the 
present  structure,  has  never  been  changed.  It  is  a  frame  house, 
but  built  in  ihe  spacious  style  of  the  time,  with  large,  airy  rooms 
and  wide  double  windows,  being  also  ornamented  inside  with  as 
tasteful  and  chaste  woodwork  as  will  be  found  anywhere.  No  defi- 
nite record  of  its  cost  has  been  preserved,  but  in  the  report  to  the 
Presbytery  die  next  spring,  ISbi,  the  congregational  expenses  for 
that  year  appear  in  the  sum  of  $2,100.  This  may  or  may  not  in- 
clude the  pastor's  salary.  But  we  can  be  confident  in  believing  that 
it  included  wliat  had  been  paid  out  in  building  the  parsonage.  This 
building,  then,  cost  at  least  $1,500  in  money,  exclusive  of  materials 
on  the  ground  and  contributed  labor;  and  perhaps  as  much  as 
$2,100.  We  arrive  at  this  by  subti'acting  $600  from  $2,100.  For 
Pisgah  is  now  paying  the  former  sum  to  its  pastor,  besides  the  use 
of  the  parsonage.  The  church  had  remained  vacant  until  the  late 
aiiiumn.  Il"  is  in  the  midst  of  the  corn  harvest,  and  perhaps  at  the 
hog-killing  fcason,  in  the  frosty  November  weather,  that  they  meet 
and  call  the  Eev.  Kobt.  W.  Alien. 

This  call  was  made  on  November  27,  1853 ;  and  on  December 
20th,  the  Presbytery  met  at  Pisgah,  as  it  had  at  other  times,  to 
install  the  new  pastor.  The  formal  presentation  and  acceptance  of 
the  call  occurred,  but  the  installation  was  postponed,  at  the  request 
of  the  pastor-elect  and  the  people,  until  Saturday,  January  7,  1854. 
Mr.  Allen  came,  as  did  Mr.  Bayless,  from  the  state  of  Indiana.  He 
and  Mrs.  Allen,  who  at  this  date  still  survives,  were  the  first  to  live  in 
the  new  parsonage.  On  April  4,  1857,  Mr.  Allen  resigned  the  care 
of  Pisgah.     He  went  thence  to  Jacksonville,  111.,  where  he  died. 

The  current  of  the  church  life  of  Pisgah  moves  smoothly  through 
the  three  years  of  Mr.  Allen's  pastorate.  And  with  the  beginning 
of  the  next  pastoi-ate  we  are  at  the  threshold  of  what  may  be  called 
the  modern  era  in  Pisgah's  history. 

Here  we  (in.ote  from  the  chronicle  of  Dr.  Hart :  "In  October, 
1857,  the  church  secured  Pev.  Eutherford  Douglas  as  supply  for 
her  pulpit, and  in  February  (it  was  the  27th)  following  extended  him 
a  call  to  the  pastorate,  which  he  accepted.  And  (he)  was  regularly 
ordained  and  installed  on  ;\pril  22,  1858,  by  the  Presbytery  of  West 
Lexington,  -wliir-h  convtmcd  in  the  church  for  that  purpose."  This 
pastorate  was  terminated  only  by  the  death  of  Dr.  Douglas,  at  his 

24 


home,  "Trevilla,"  between  Pisgah  and  Lexington,  April  8th,  1890. 
He  spent  his  entire  ministerial  life  in  charge  of  this  church.  For 
several  years  he  lived  in  the  parsonage.  During  the  last  years  of 
the  period  each  Sunday  was  divided  between  Pisgah  and  the  neigh- 
boring church.  Bethel.  His  actual  pastorate  was  more  than  thirty- 
two  years  long,  and  so  far  is  the  longest  continuous  pastorate  in  the 
history  of  the  church.  Mrs.  Douglas  is  yet  spared  to  us,  and  is  still 
a  member  of  Pisgah.  In  this  long  time  many  things  occurred  in 
the  life  of  the  church  itself,  and  in  other  spheres  the  events 
in  which  would  affect  its  life. 

It  begins  when  the  war  cloud  was  lowering.  An  early  portion 
of  it  is  the  period  of  this  storm  that  burst  over  tlie  whole  land.  It 
includes  the  material,  commercial,  and  educational  development 
of  Kentucky  in  modern  ways.  The  records  of  the  church  show  but 
little  of  these  charges,  and  one  must  read  carefully  and  con- 
tinuously between  the  lines.  The  reports  of  the  church  to  the  suc- 
cessive meetings  of  Presbytery  show  an  improvement  in  the  system 
and  regularity  of  giving.  And  the  amounts  given  become  larger. 
The  salary  with  which  Dr.  Douglas  began  was  $700,  the  largest  up 
to  that  time  recorded  in  the  history  of  the  church.  Meetings — 
^'protracted"  meetings  they  were  then,  "evangelistic"  is  what  they 
are  now — are  frequently  held.  Additions  to  the  church  mark  all 
these.  But  there  are  also  many  dismissals.  The  children  of  Pis- 
gah are  beginning  to  seek  homes  in  other  places,  even  as  their 
ancestors  left  their  native  haunts  for  the  wilds  of  Kentucky  when 
it  was  a  new  land.  So  there  does  not  appear  any  great  gain  in 
actual  membership. 

The  division  of  the  Presbyterian  church  into  Northern  and 
Southern,  which  took  place  hard  upon  the  war,  and  as  one  of  its 
fruits,  disturbed  the  life  of  Pisgah  church  but  little.  Once  more 
it  weathered  a  storm,  violent  as  ecclesiastical  storms  are  always 
likely  to  be,  and,  in  this  case  involved  in  all  the  fierce  passion  of  a 
bloody  civil  struggle.  It  did  not  divide.  Once  more,  from  the  con- 
fusion and  conflict,  Pisgah  emerges,  united,  compact  and  vigorous. 
In  1868,  the  old  stone  building,  where  foundations  were  laid  to 
the  echo  of  the  guns  of  1812,  was  remodeled.  From  the  ancient 
square  style  it  was  changed  to  gothic.  Dr.  Hart  writes :  ''The 
walls  up  to  the  window  sills,  the  whole  northern  wall,  all  the  floor- 
ing and  foundation,  were  left  just  as  they  were  built  in  1812.  But 
the  rest  was  made  new."    Some  twenty  years  afterwards  Dr.  Eobert 

25 


C.  James  placed  within  it  a  beautiful  aud  complete  set  of  stained 
glass  windows  in  memory  of  his  mother,  a  devoted  member  of 
Pisgah.  An  oriole  window  of  the  same  kind  was  placed  above  the 
pulpit,  by  the  congregation,  in  memory  of  Dr.  Douglas.  The  wood- 
work and  interior  decorations  are  in  keeping  with  the  gothic  build- 
ing and  the  windows,  while  the  exterior  is  covered  with  ivy.  Grief- 
stricken  as  Pisgah  M'as  at  the  loss  of  Dr.  Douglas  we  find  that  as 
early  as  October  15th,  1890,  alive  to  the  need  of  continuing  her 
regular  work  and  service,  she  calls  to  the  pastorate,  the  Eev.  Eras- 
mus E.  Ervin,  from  the  Presbytery  of  Tuscaloosa,  Ala,  at  a  salary 
of  $800.00,  with  tlie  use  of  the  parsonage  of  course.  He  accepted, 
and  was  regularly  installed  in  November  17th,  1890.  Mr.  Ervin. 
resigned,  and  at  his  own  request  was  released  from  the  care  of 
Pisgah  to  take  charge  of  the  church  at  De  Funiak  Springs,  Florida. 
He,  at  the  time  of  this  writing,  resides  at  Kingstree,  S.  C,  and  has 
charge  of  a  group  of  churches  in  the  vicinity.  Evangelistic  meet- 
ings and  earnest  pastoral  attention  characterized  this  pastorate. 
Additions  to  the  church  were  the  fruits  of  these  efforts. 

Without  undue  delay  Pisgah  called  Eev.  Coleman  0.  Groves,  a 
student  at  Louisville  Theological  Seminary,  on  April  7th,  1897,  the 
salary  to  be  $600.00.  He  accepted  and  was  ordained  and  installed 
on  June  12th,  1897,  Presbytery  meeting  at  Pisgah  for  the  purpose 
of  his  examination.  Mr.  Groves  is  a  native  Kentuckian.  He  came 
to  Pisgah  unmarried,  but  in  a  few  weeks  married  Miss  Mary  Wood- 
son, of  Louisville.  At  the  very  beginnig  of  his  pastorate  a  meeting 
was  held  in  which  Eev.  Joseph  Hopper,  known  widely  as  "Uncle 
Joe,"  did  the  preaching.  Twenty-four  names  were  added  to  the 
roll.  Mr.  Groves  resigned  on  November  8th,  1903,  to  remove  to 
Florida,  where  he  first  became  pastor  of  the  church  of  Braiden- 
town,  and  afterwards  of  the  Orlando  church,  which  he  continues 
to  serve. 

Pisgah  again  acted  with  her  accustomed  promptness,  and  on 
May  10th  of  that  same  year  called  Eev.  W.  0.  Shewmaker,  then 
residing  at  Georgetown,  Ky.,  and  until  some  months  previous  the 
pastor  of  the  church  there.  The  salary  named  was  $600.  He 
accepted,  and  was  installed  on  September  27th.  He  is  the  present 
pastor. 


26 


THE  OLD  ACAJJK.MV. 
"Oh  '   Where  are  the  spirits  liriglit 
Who   filled   these  halls  with   life  and   lit;ht?" 


I 


Cfje  Motv  of  tije  ^cfjool 

HEN  the  history  of  Kentucky  to  this  time  is  fully  written 
the  school  that  will  appear  in  it  as  the  center  of 
potent  influence  will  not  be  the  one  taught  in  the 
"little  red  school  house"  that  is  the  shrine  of  other 
parts  of  our  land.  But  it  will  be  the  private  school,  gathered  under 
some  true  disciple  of  learning  and  master  of  teaching,  under  the 
patronage  of  the  fathers  of  the  neighborhood,  determined  that  their 
children  should  not  grow  up  in  ignorance  while  the  legislative 
mills  slowly  ground  their  meagre  grist,  and  the  needed  pul^lic 
education  waited  on  the  law's  delay.  Such  a  school,  a  private  one, 
if  you  will,  but  a  school  of  tJie  neighborhood,  was  that  which  was 
started  at  Pisgah  at  about  the  time  of  the  founding  of  the  church. 
For  it  was  a  Presbyterian  church,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind.  And 
while  the  modern  proverb  has  gone  abroad  that  you  can  not  have 
a  Presbyterian  church  in  a  town  without  a  bank,  it  was  at  least  in 
old  times  true  that  where  a  Presbyterian  church  was  there  also  was 
a  school.  And  unto  this  hour  it  is  true  that  the  Presbyterian  young 
folk  are  in  school  somewhere,  though  their  parents  may  not  l)uild 
as  many  schools  as  they  once  did.  It  is  to  tradition  alone  that  we 
are  obliged  to  go  for  the  beginning  of  the  story  of  education  at 
Pisgah.  But  no  tradition  was  ever  clearer  or  more  unbroken,  than 
that  about  the  time  the  church  was  built,  and  not  for  from  it,  a 
school  house  was  also  built.  It  is  pictured  as  of  logs,  of  course,  but 
a  double  log  house.  Between  the  two  rooms  was  the  "passage"  as 
we  call  it,  or  "dog-trot,"  as  our  Virginia  neighbors  say,  or  hall,  as 
our  children  will  have  to  hear  it  called  in  order  to  have  any  idea  of 
it.  In  one  of  these  the  teacher  lived.  In  the  other  he  taught.  Tra- 
dition has  not  taken  the  trouble  to  remark  that  he  was  a  bachelor. 
Of  course  he  was.  "Were  not  all  those  "jolly  old  pedagogues"  of 
"long  ago"  single  men  ?  The  spring  that  still  sends  its  stream  forth 
from  under  the  Pisgah  hill  furnished  the  water  for  the  bare-foot 
boys  and  girls  who  loitered  around  it  with  the  school  bucket,  while 
the  lessons  were  running  their  weary  course  up  in  the  school  house 
a  hundred  and  twenty-five  years  ago.    Married,  or  single,  whichever 

27 


he  actually  was,  the  story  that  comes  down  to  us  preserves  his  name. 
It  was  Andrews.  The  first  of  it  has  fallen  into  the  silence  of  those 
ancient  years.  Nor  is  there  any  chronicle  of  his  length  of  service. 
All  else  that  has  come  to  us  is  that  he  moved  from  Pisgali  to  Ohio. 
There  is  also  either  a  genuine  tradition,  or  a  guess  of  a  somewhat 
later  time,  that  he  sometimes  conducted  religious  services  there  at 
Pisgah.  And  this  may  help  to  account  for  the  apparent  ease  with 
wliich  the  congregation  of  the  Eev.  Adam  Rankin  was  formed 
when  we  first  hear  of  Pisgah  as  a  church.  Ten  years  after  the 
known  beginning  of  church  life  at  Pisgah  we  find  the  Presbytery 
of  Transylvania  establishing  a  grammar  school  and  a  public  sem- 
inary. That  education  was  flourishing  about  the  log  house  of  Mr. 
Andrews  may  be  surely  inferred  from  the  fact  that  though  the 
Presb3i;ery  covered  all  Kentucky  it  seems  to  have  quickly  chosen 
Pisgah  as  the  place  for  its  new  school.  The  tuition  was  fixed  at 
four  pounds,  (about  thirteen  dollars  in  United  States  money)  a 
year.  Mr.  Andrew  Steele  was  appointed  by  Presb^^tery  as  teacher. 
In  the  spring  of  1796  he  was  succeeded  by  James  Moore,  and  on 
October  6th  of  the  next  j'ear  Jno.  Thompson  is  successor  to  Mr. 
Moore.  The  school  was  under  the  care  of  Presbyter}-,  and  a  minis- 
ter of  the  Presbytery  was  to  be  appointed  to  take  oversight  of  it ;  the 
teacher  was  to  be  appointed  by  the  Presbytery,  and  promising 
3^ouths  were  to  be  sought  out  to  be  educated.  If  they  were  unable 
to  provide  for  themselves  the  church  was  to  contribute  to  their 
support.  And  it  was  recommended  that  a  contribution  be  made  for 
this  purpose;  all  heads  of  families  to  give  annually  for  four  years, 
"two  shilling  and  three  pence."  The  president  of  the  Seminary  was 
to  be  a  minister.  But  there  were  to  be  no  efforts  used  to  induce 
pupils  to  change  their  religious  beliefs,  "any  further  than  is  con- 
sistent with  the  general  belief  in  the  gospel  system,  and  the  practice 
of  vital  piety."  The  trustees  were  to  be  twenty-one  in  number,  one 
half  to  be  always  Presbyterian  ministers  of  Kentucky  Presbyteries. 
Forty-seven  gentlemen  in  the  various  congregations  were  appointed 
to  collect  money  for  the  project.  A  charter  was  procured  for  the 
Seminary,  under  the  title,  "The  Kentucky  Academy."  This  was 
in  December  1794,  some  eight  months  after  the  first  action  of  the 
Presbytery.  While  the  Grammar  School  went  on,  collections  for 
the  Seminary  were  pushed.  Subscriptions  and  donations  in  the 
State  amounted  to  upwards  of  one  thousand  pounds,  or  $3,333  in 
the  federal  currency  of  the  time.     "Father"  Rice  and  Dr.  Blythe 

28 


the  pastor  at  Pisgali,  were  sent  to  the  General  Assembly  of  1795. 
and  presented  the  cause  of  the  Kentucky  Academy  throughout  the 
East;,  collecting  nearly  $10,000.  George  Washington  subscribed 
$100,  Jno.  Adams  $100,  and  Aaron  Burr  $50.  Dr.  George  Gordon 
of  London,  England,  secured  for  the  young  Seminary  a  small,  but 
valuable,  library  and  "philosophical  apparatus,"  or  as  we  should  say. 
laboratory  equipment.  That  equipment  however,  was  chiefly,  if  not 
entirely,  an  air-pump,  microscope,  telescope  and  prisms.  The 
money  from  abroad  amounted  to  eighty  pounds,  two  shillings  and 
six  pence.  The  very  names  of  these  English  friends  of  the  Ken- 
tucky Presbyterians  who  gave  these  contributions  have  been  pre- 
served to  us. 

But  in  the  meantime  Paris  and  Harrodsburg  are  alive  to  the 
fact  that  the  institution  is  to  be  a  reality.  And  they  each  want  it,. 
But  the  Grammar  School  is  already  at  Pisgah,  the  people  there  are 
interested  and  offer  inducements  and — (and  we  think  this  is  no 
small  factor  in  the  result) — Dr.  Bl3^the  is  also  at  Pisgah.  So  the 
Grammar  School  is  transferred  with  all  its  property  to  the  Ken- 
tucky Academy,  which  opens  in  the  fall  of  1797,  not  at  Paris,  or 
at  Harrodsburg,  but  at  Pisgah.  The  Transylvania  Seminary  was 
open  at  Lexington,  as  it  had  been  for  some  years  before  the  found- 
ing of  the  Pisgah  school.  Indeed,  the  Pisgah  school  was  a  protest 
against  the  action  of  the  tni.stees  of  Transylvania  in  placing  at 
the  head  of  that  institution  Mr.  Toulmin,  a  Unitarian.  Pisgah 
outstripped  the  older  institution  in  town,  although  Mr.  James  Moore, 
who  had  been  deposed  to  make  room  for  Mr.  Toulmin,  had  been 
recalled  to  be  its  head,  the  la  iter  having  resigned  to  become  Sec- 
retary of  State. 

Finally,  on  December  22,  1798,  the  Legislatnre,  acting  upon 
the  request  of  the  trustees  of  the  Kentucky  Academy  and  the  trus- 
tees of  Transylvania  Seminary,  united  the  two  into  one  institution 
to  be  called  Tlie  Transylvania  University.  The  board  of  the  new 
institution  was  to  be  twenty-one  in  number,  the  majority  to  be 
Presbyterians :  the  charter  cnuld  not  be  changed  except  upon  a  pe- 
tition of  at  least  eleven  of  the  trustees,  and  the  board  was  self- 
perpetuating.  But  Pisgah  did  not  send  away  her  interest  in  edu- 
cation along  with  the  institution,  and  a  flourishing  school  was  main- 
tained there  during  the  greater  part  of  the  last  century,  now  under 
one  teacher,  and  now  under  another.  Its  fame  and  influence  were 
especially  great  when  Dr.  Louis  Marshall,  who  lived  in  the  neigh- 

29 


borhood,  and  who  was  an  elder  in  Pissrah  church,  conducted  it.  As 
a  teacher  he  had  great  reputation.  He  was  a  brother  of  the  great 
Chief  Justice  ^Farshall.  The  famous  Kentucky  orators,  Thomas 
F.  and  Edward  ^Marshall,  were  his  sons.  In  later  times  Prof.  Al- 
mon  Spencer,  the  father  of  Prof.  A.  E.  Spencer,  of  Clinton,  S.  C, 
conducted  a  flourishing  academy  at  Pisgah,  and  most  of  the  present 
generation  of  Pisgali's  grown  people  received  at  least  their  earlier 
school  training  from  him.  The  introduction  of  rapid  transit  which 
has  put  all  the  Central  Kentucky  country  into  close  and  easy  con- 
nection with  the  towns  has  made  the  need  for  a  local  school  at 
Pisgah  less  keenly  felt  than  it  was  in  former  times.  And  since  the 
resignation  of  the  school  in  1907  by  the  present  pastor  of  the 
church,  who  had  taught  a  few  pupils  for  three  years  previous,  there 
has  been  no  school  in  the  historic  school  house  at  Pisgah.  The 
district  school  is  located  less  than  a  mile  from  the  church. 

The  history  of  Transylvania  University  was  soon  such  that  the 
Presbyterian  people  of  the  state  turned  their  attention  to  the 
founding  of  a  new  institution,  and  ultimately  obtained  the  Centre 
College.  So  that,  in  a  very  true  sense,  from  Pisgah  has  sprung  two 
noteworthy  institutions  of  learning. 

The  late  Col.  W.  C.  P.  Breckinridge  vvTote  of  the  Pisgah  school 
as  follows :  "As  mere  examples  of  the  youth  who  have  been  taught 
there  we  might  select  at  random  the  families  w^ho  have  made  a 
mark  upon  the  history  of  Kentucky.  As,  for  instance,  the  four 
Crittenden  brothers,  John  J.  Crittenden,  Henry  Crittenden, 
Thom.as  Crittenden  and  Robert  Crittenden;  or  the  Breckinridge 
brothers,  Cabell  Breckinridge,  John  Breckinridge,  Robert  J.  Breck- 
inridge and  William  Breckinridge;  or  the  Marshall  brothers, 
Thomas  F.  Marshall,  Judge  William  C.  Marshall  and  E.  C.  Mar- 
shall."   Col.  Breckinridge,  himself,  was  a  student  there. 

Through  the  loving  labor  of  the  ladies  of  the  church,  a  few 
years  ago,  the  old  stone  building,  where  the  famous  school  had  so 
long  been  taught,  was  remodeled.  Tt  stands,  modest  and  tasteful, 
just  to  the  rear  and  side  of  the  church,  a  perpetual  memorial  to 
Pisgah's  past  as  a  center  of  education. 


3(; 


THE  SCHOOL  HOUSE  OF  TODAY, 
On  the  site  of  the  old  building. 


^3fi 


Wl)t  ^torp  of  tfje  Communitp 


ITCH  of  it  has  already  been  told;  for  the  church  and 
school  not  only  affected  the  life  of  the  community, 
but  were  also  channels  through  which  that  life  moved 
and  in  which  it  expressed  itself.  The  story  of  either 
of  them  is  also  a  part  of  the  story  of  the  community.  But,  of 
course,  there  is  a  story  separate  from  that  which  belongs  to  them. 
Eor,  after  all,  what  is  told  of  them  does  not  form  the  whole  of  Pis- 
gah's  history.  There  is,  therefore,  something  else  to  tell.  This  story 
of  the  community  comes  to  us,  in  the  form  that  we'  have  it,  solely 
through  the  lips  of  the  people.  It  is  not  a  wi'itten  history.  But  it  has 
come  from  father  to  son  by  word  of  mouth.  This  means  that  there 
is  much  of  it  that  is  not  told  at  all.  For  there  are  many  interesting 
chapters  of  it  hidden  away  in  old  letters,  family  Bibles  and  the 
mouldy  records  of  the  offices  of  the  county  courts.  Even  if  all 
of  this  had  as  3^et  been  gathered  together  the  limits  of  this  slight 
volume  would  not  permit  its  full  record  here.  What  is  put  down 
here  is  that  Avhich  is  current,  the  tradition  received  from,  the 
fathers.  Xor  does  it  come  from  a  time  more  remote  than  the  first 
settlement  of  the  locality.  If  it  was  followed  beyond  that,  it  would 
take  us  back  across  the  mountains  into  A^irginia,  and  across  the 
ocean  into  the  north  of  Ireland,  and  thence  to  Scotland.  Other 
threads  of  it  that  unite  here  at  Pisgah  would  lead  us  to  the  same 
native  haunts  of  Presbyteriani.^m  beyond  the  seas,  but  through 
Pennsylvania  instead  of  Virginia.  And  there  is  reason  to  believe 
that  Merry  England,  as  well  as  the  sterner  lands  just  mentioned, 
would  be  found  if  still  other  threads  of  the  story  were  followed  to 
their  starting  place. 

"The  story  runneth  thus":  It  was  in  wild  March  weather  in 
the  year  17  80  tliat  Samuel  Stevenson  and  Jane  Gay,  his  wife,  came 
from  the  fort  in  Lexington  to  live  in  their  log  cabin,  their  new 
home,  erected  on  the  lands  which  they  had  surveyed  in  the  new 
Kentucky  country.  It  stood  upon  the  wooded  point  of  land  just 
west  of  the  present  site  of  the  church.  The  house  had  been  built 
by  Stevenson  and  his  slaves,  with  the  help  of  his  brothers-in-law, 

31 


Alexander  Diinlap  and  John  (iay,  and  their  friend,  Closes  Mc- 
Ilvain.  In  the  same  season  were  built  the  homes  of  Dunlap  and 
Agnes  Gay,  his  wife;  of  John  Gay  and  Sally  Lockridge;  of  Moses 
Mcllvain  and  Margaret  Hodge.  These  homes  were  within  a  mile 
of  each  other  and  each  near  to  a  spring  of  water.  The  grant  of 
land  had  originally  been  acquired  and  the  claim  located  by  Samuel 
Stevenson.  He  and  Dunlap  had  each  married  sisters  of  John  Gay. 
These  were  Sf^otch-Irish  A'irginians,  all  from  Augusta  Coimty  in 
Virginia.  One  almost  certain  indication  of  the  Scotch-Irish  origin 
of  the  Gays,  at  least,  is  the  fact  that  tlie  name  was  once  pronounced 
"Guy" — as  unto  this  hour  the  unmixed  Scotch-Irishman  of  West- 
ern Pennsylvania,  for  instance,  speaks  of  today  as  though  he  were 
talking  of  "to  die."  These  were  they  who  settled  the  immediate 
neighborhood.  But  we  use  the  term  community  in  the  broadest 
sense,  and  make  it  include  Pisgah's  permanent  congregation.  About 
the  same  tinie,  even  earlier,  pioneer  Presbyterian  families  had  set- 
tled in  the  region,  the  furthest  not  being  more  than  six  miles 
away.  Among  them  were  the  Aliens,  Scotts,  Evanses,  Garretts 
(who  came  to  Fort  Garrett  in  1778),  Eennicks,  Martins,  Longs, 
Fergiisons,  Burriers,  Blacks,  Eobbs,  Elliotts,  Watsons,  Campbells, 
Howes,  Steeles,  Wardlaws,  Youngs'  and  Stewarts.  Another  pioneer 
family,  only  three  miles  from  the  church,  was  that  of  the  Wasons, 
who  came  out  from  the  Lexington  stockade  in  1780  or  1781.  At 
the  first,  though  a  part  of  the  community  in  every  sense,  they  were 
members  of  the  Associate  Reformed  Church  in  Lexington.  Fi- 
nally they  became  members  of  Pisgah,  Dr.  R.  H.  Wason  being  one 
of  its  elders. 

Three  families  of  Stevensons  settled  here,  none  of  them  related 
to  each  other.  At  a  somewhat  later  period  otiier  names  appear 
among  the  people  of  Pisgah.  Among  them  are  Marshal  Is,  Hardins, 
Richeys,  Stones,  Smedleys,  Spencers,  Youngs,  Taylors,  Berrymans, 
Miltons,  Linghamfelters,  McPheeters,  Castlemans,  Bohannons, 
MoCroskeys,  Scrogins,  Stogdols,  Coxes,  Wallaces,  Alexanders, 
Hedgers,  Wheelers,  Worleys,  Coffmans,  Jameses,  Halls,  Andersons, 
Eastons,  Carrs,  Kinkeads,  Armstrongs,  Whittingtons,  Aikins, 
Thompsons,  Boardmans,  Lytles,  Waltzes,  Fraziers,  Burnams, 
Berrys,  Hamiltons.  Besides  these,  there  were  doubtless  others  near 
the  first.  And  certainly,  from  iime  to  time,  new  families  have  come 
into  the  community  and  to  the  church.  This  narrative  does  not 
attempt  to  give  any  complete  list  of  Pisgah's  people. 

32 


THE  LATEST  IMMIGRATION  OF  PRESBYTERIANS 

Shortly  after  the  Civil  War  there  occurred  a  distinct  migration 
into  the  Pisgah  community  and  church  which  markedly  affected 
the  life  of  both.  It  consisted  of  the  removal  from  Alabama  to 
Pisgah  of  four  Presbyterian  families,  namely,  the  Powells,  Fal- 
coners, McEachins,  and  Harts. 

About  twenty-five  years  ago  the  introduction  of  the  culture  of 
tobacco  brought  into  this  neighborhood  several  families  from  other 
counties.  Many  of  them  have  become  permanent  residents  of  the 
community,  and  r^ome  of  them  members  of  Pisgah  church;  as,  for 
instance,  the  Smithers  family,  the  Littrells,  Brewers,  and  Wises. 

The  actual  story  of  the  community  could  be  fully  writ- 
ten only  by  writing  the  history  of  each  of  these  families, 
and  of  the  others  whose  lives  have  mingled  to  form  the 
main  current  of  that  of  Pisgah.  This,  of  course,  is  beyond  our 
province,  as  well  as  our  powers.  Only  the  outstanding  features  of 
the  history  of  the  people  as  a  whole  can  be  noted.  It  is  not  even 
then  a  "thrilling^'  history  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  that  phrase.  But 
it  is  a  history  full  of  human  interest.  It  is  not  filled  with  pictures 
of  desperate  scenes  painted  in  fierce  colors.  But  there  abound  in 
it  sweet  and  charming  scenes  of  home-life:  of  quiet,  pastoral  lands; 
of  grazing  cattle,  shadowed  pastures,  rich  meadows,  and  fields  of 
waving  grain  and  standing  corn.  It  is  the  history  of  a  simple, 
brave,  refined  and  high-minded  people.  There  is  warrior  blood  in 
some  of  them,  and  there  are  not  wanting  among  them  those  who 
have  given  their  blood  to  their  country.  But  they  have  sent  no 
great  captain  into  the  army.  They  have  been,  and  are,  interested 
in  education.  But  no  great  scholar  has  gone  from  them.  They  are 
industrious,  prudent,  thrifty,  knowing  the  money  value  of  an  acre 
of  ground,  or  a  head  of  live  stock  to  the  last  cent.  But  no  immense 
fortune  has  been  accumulated  by  any  of  them.  Their  history  can 
not  but  be  lacking  in  sensational  events.  And  this  means  also  that 
to  the  criminal  history  of  Kentucky,  which  at  its  shortest  is  all 
too  voluminous,  and  to  the  reputation  for  violence  which  the  state 
has  so  long  borne,  the  Pisgah  community  has  contributed  exceed- 
ingly little.  Her  people  have  been  home-making  and  God-fearing. 
Thus  have  they  lived.  And  so  their  annals  are  simple.  These  are 
made  up  of  the  records  of  births,  marriages,  deaths.  And  even  so 
their  history  is  fraught  with  the  interest  which  centers  in  those 

33 


great  words,  and  which  makes  the  tale  of  any  novelist  worth  the 
telling  and  the  hearing. 

The  community  has  taken  its  part  in  public  matters  as  a  body 
of  staunch  dependable  citizens,  voting  clean  tickets  with  a  clear 
conscience.  Not  always  have  they  agreed  as  to  the  policy  proper 
in  these  matters.  They,  indeed,  seldom  vote  unanimously.  The 
community  ic  no  longer,  nor  has  it  been  for  many  years,  prac- 
tically one  church.  On  the  contrary,  descendants  of  the  original 
Pisgah  church  are  found  in  the  neighboring  churches  of  other  de- 
nominations. They  live,  however,  neighbors,  friends,  and  kindred 
to  those  who  still  cultivate  the  faith  of  their  fathers  at  the  altars 
which  their  common  ancestors  were  united  to  build.  They  differ  on 
questions  of  both  politics  and  religion,  but  without  unseemly  strife 
and  with  mutual  respect  and  good  will.  They  have  contributed  to 
the  strength  cf  other  communities  by  the  sending  of  their  people 
to  dwell  in  new  places.  Towns  and  cities  of  our  own  state,  and  of 
other  states,  especially  those  of  the  older  and  the  newer  West,  have 
received  these  recruits  from  the  strong,  wholesome  life  of  Pisgah; 
and  they  are  not  the  worse  thereby. 

Of  course  this  history  is  not  without  its  darker  pictures,  its 
pages  that  we  cannot  help  wishing  need  never  have  been  written. 
For  it  i.^  a  bit  of  human  history,  and  such  pages  are  always  to  be 
found  in  it.  The  record  of  Eden  is  not  without  them.  And  they 
will  always  be  foimd  in  the  bistory  of  man  until  his  annals  become 
those  of  the  City  "where  no  evil  thing  cometh  to  despoil  what  is 
fair."  The  Pi«gah  people  have  had  their  tragedies,  but  not  of  the 
kind  that  make  tbe  material  of  the  sensational  newspapers.  They 
have  had  their  estrangements  and  their  heartburnings,  but  they 
have  striven  to  live  at  peace  with  all  men.  They  have  had  their 
deep  ami  awful  sorrows,  but  these  have  been  bravely  borne.  A 
hundred  and  twenty-five  years  is,  after  all,  a  short  time,  long  as 
it  may  sound.  And  we  realize  it  when  we  attempt  to  uncover  the 
life  of  a  people  whose  existence  as  a  community  has  been  no  longer 
than  that.  We  find  that  to  write  their  history  means  not  only  to 
reveal  the  secrets  of  the  dead,  but  also  to  unveil  the  holy  places  of 
the  living. 

Therefore,  we  close  the  book  even  as  we  are  opening  it.  It  is 
evident  that  as  a  whole  the  people  of  Pisgah  have  not  sought  tlie 

34 


more  brilliant,  but  not  always"  clesiral:)le,  prizes  of  life,  but  rather 
those  more  substantial  if  less  glittering  rewards,  the  winning  of 
which  brings  less  clanger  both  to  character  and  good  fortune.  And 
herein  lies  a  part  of  the  secret  of  their  continuity  as  a  community, 
and  of  their  prosperity. 


35 


Ct)p  Spirit  of  Bisiqaf) 

JTTEKE  is  such  a  thing.  Pisgah  is  not  one  of  those 
communities  the  separate  parts  of  which  tempt  one 
to  believe  in  the  possibility  of  a  fortuitous  concourse 
of  atoms.  The  people  are  homogeneous.  Their 
unitLHl  life  lias  manifested  the  same  characteristic.  Further  than 
that,  there  has  been  a  distinct  spirit  emanating  from  the  commu- 
nity. In  making  an  assertion  of  this  sort  the  writer  possesses  the 
advantage  of  not  being  native  to  the  community  and  at  the  same 
time  a  resident  in  it  for  a  term  of  years  sufficiently  long  to  justify 
his  claim  to  speak  on  this  subject.  He  approaches  it  from  with- 
out, and  yet  s^^npatheticallv  and  not  ignorantly.  His  knowl- 
edge of  other  Kentucky  communities  also  is  sufficiently  full 
to  at  least  enable  him  to  detect  anything  distinctive  in  this  one. 
But  even  so  he  cannot  claim  to  be  the  only,  or  even  the  original, 
discoverer  of  the  Spirit  of  Pisgah.  This  fact,  of  course,  only  con- 
firms him  in  his  conviction  that  there  is  such  a  spirit.  For  instance, 
a  venerable  man,  whose  knowledge  of  the  people  of  Kentucky  and 
of  all  the  South  is  as  great,  perhaps,  as  that  of  any  man  anywhere, 
but  who  has  never  been  connected  in  any  direct  Avay  with  Pisgah, 
said  only  lately  to  the  writer  that  there  had  gone  out  from  it  (the 
church  was  especially  in  his  mind")  a  strong  and  clearly  distin- 
guishable influence,  an  influence  for  good. 

We  seek,  then,  to  discover  just  what  is  this  Spirit  of  Pisgah. 
We  naturally  expect  to  find  it  illustrated  in  its  past.  Turning  the 
pages  that  we  have  just  written,  we  find  tliat  the  Pisgah  people 
came  to  Kentucky,  not  as  hunters,  nor  as  Indian  fighters,  nor  as 
adventurers.  "Many  such  did  come.  But  the  people  who  came  to 
Pisgah  came  as  men  of  peace.  Thev  were  settlers.  Their  peaceful 
character  is  again  sho\Mi  in  the  fact  that  but  very  few  of  them 
went  to  any  of  the  wars  in  which  the  country  has  been  involved 
since  they  came  here.  And,  further  still,  the  persistent  refusal  to 
let  their  life  as  one  people  be  disrupted  by  political,  religious,  or 
personal  quarrels,  illustrates  the  same  love  of  peace.  Dr.  Bl3d:he, 
in  his  farewell  sermon,  remijids  his  people  that  on  tlie  day  of  his 

36 


arrival  among  them,  more  than  forty  years  before,  he  found  the 
church  divided  and  distracted.  Adam  Rankin  had  his  devoted 
friends  here.  But  while  ruling  elder,  Wm.  Scott,  appeals  to  the 
Presbytery  against  the  action  of  the  session,  vrhich  his  pastor  ap- 
proved, and  afterwards  appears  as  an  elder  in  Clear  Creek,  there 
is  no  wholesale  leaving  of  the  church  to  escape  from  the  eccentric 
pastor.  And  when  the  Presbytery  takes  the  painful,  but  necessary, 
action  deposing  Rankin  from  the  ministry,  there  is  no  body  of 
people  at  all  at  Pisgah,  though  a  large  one  at  Lexington,  to  rally 
around  him  to  form  an  independent  church.  On  the  contrary.  Dr. 
Blythe  distinctly  reminds  the  people  that,  young  and  unknown  as 
he  was,  God  blessed  his  efforts  to  the  healing  of  all  strife.  The 
ways  of  Pisgah  are  the  paths  of  peace. 

In  the  quiet  safety  of  the  lives  that  have  been  lived  here  there 
has  also  been  shown  unvarying  and  cautious  prudence.  There  is 
no  recklessness.  The  spirit  of  the  mere  adventurer,  either  as  In- 
dian fighter  or  as  gambler,  was  not  the  one  that  prompted  them  to 
come  to  these  fair  lands.  Nor  have  they  treated  their  inheritance 
as  a  stake.  This  is  not  to  say  that  they  are  miserly,  for  that  they 
are  not.  But  they  have,  with,  careful  judgment,  planned  to  acquire, 
and  keep,  the  sweet  and  pleasant  comfort  with  which  they  are  sur- 
rounded. 

The  history  of  Pisgah  shows  also  a  spirit  of  high  loyalty.  A 
brilliant  woman  once  said  to  the  writer  that  loyalty  was  "loving- 
ness."  And  the  loyalty  shown  by  Pisgah,  at  least,  gives  ground 
for  such  a  definition.  Pisgah  loves  her  past.  It  is  said  that  her 
forefathers,  while  not  coming  to  Kentuclcy  as  a  church  moving  in 
one  body,  as  did  a  certain  other  historic  body  of  Virginians  who 
came  this  way,  yet  brought  with  them  from  Virginia  the  name  of 
the  home  church  there,  and  transplanted  Pisgah  from  the  mother 
state  into  this  Kentucky  wilderness. 

The  vast  body  of  our  American  citizens  of  today  cannot  con- 
ceive the  passion  with  which  these  people  love  their  lands,  which 
have  come  down  from  father  to  son.  Perhaps  no  one  in  the  world 
now  can  understand  it  except  an  Englishman.  They  are  loyal  also 
to  their  traditions,  those  of  sobriety,  purity,  honor,  and  piety.  In 
their  eyes — of  whatever  denomination  they  may  be — it  is  only  a 
natural  and  altogether  to  be  expected  thing  that  a  man  be  a  member 
of  the  church.  And  they  are  loyal  to  it.  The  church  is  not  an 
outside  thing,  intruding  itself  upon  their  life.    It  is  not  a  conven- 

37 


tion  either.  It  is  a  natural,  necessary  and  holy  institution,  part 
and  parcel  of  their  lives.  They  are  loyal  to  their  religious  faith, 
preserving  it  without  parading  it ;  respecting  the  opinions  of  others, 
and  not  ashamed  of  their  own.  To  their  pastors  they  are  steadily, 
encouragingly  true,  and  among  the  churches  and  the  ministers  they 
are  proverbial  for  this  loyalty.  It  is  indeed  a  matter  of  wonder 
that  any  considerable  body  of  them  could  have  petitioned,  as  they 
did,  to  be  released  from  the  pastoral  care  of  Eev.  Adam  Eankin. 
It  is  as  clear  an  indication  as  one  could  well  have  that  the  provo- 
cation was  great,  and  that  their  first  pastor,  while  energetic  and 
able,  was  yet  a  man  eccentric  and  difficult.  This  is  the  explanation 
also  of  the  marked  and  tender  devotion  to  them  which  seems  to 
have  been  felt  by  every  pastor  who  has  served  them.  The  feeling 
pervades  the  restrained  and  formal  periods  of  Dr.  Blythe's  fare- 
well after  foi-ty  years.  We  detect  it  unto  this  day  in  its  yellow, 
crumbling  pages.  It  breathes  ia  the  letter  of  the  dying  Cunning- 
ham, who  had  lived  with  them  only  one  year.  Jacob  Price  and  TJuth- 
erford  Douglas  died  among  them,  each  counting  them  as  his  very 
own.  And  the  heart  of  the  widow  of  Eobert  Allen  turns  unto  them 
tenderly  even  to  this  hoiir.  While  Mrs.  Douglas  has  never  allowed 
herself  to  be  parted  from  them,  despite  the  necessity  of  absence  in 
the  body.  No-  will  the  two  men  who  have  been  pastors  at  Pisgah, 
and  who  today  are  j-et  on  the  earth,  working  happily  in  other  fields, 
however  much  their  devotion  to  other  people,  deny  the  fact  or  be 
offended  at  this  public  statement  of  it,  that  their  love  for  Pisgah 
and  her  people  is  a  thing  apart.  Of  course,  it  is  to  be  remembered 
that  loyalty  doe?  not  show  itself  only  in  the  quiet  ways  just  men- 
tioned. And  so  we  find  in  the  people  of  Pisgah  that  the  spirit  of  loy- 
alty issues  in  a  power  of  strong  protest.  A  widely  known  attorney, 
not  a  native  of  Pisgah,  not  having  ever  lived  there,  speaking  one  day 
of  the  establishment  of  the  Kentucky  Academy  there,  said  to  the 
writer,  "Pisgah  was  a  protest."  And  so,  when  occasion  offers,  the 
spirit  of  Pisgah  can  show  itself  as  a  power  to  front  injustice  or 
wrong  of  any  sort. 

It  is  the  almost  universal  custom  today  to  consider  every  coun- 
try community  as  bcliiiul-hand  in  all  tilings,  and  as  willingly  so. 
Country  people  are  considered  altogether  unteaehable  until  they 
move  to  town.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  notion  is  a  baseless  super- 
stition. Here  at  Pisgah  it  is  clearly  imfounded.  The  people  are 
conservative;   but  they   are   not   retrogressive.     They  respect  the 

38 


past.  They  would  save  what  is  worth  keeping.  But  they  do  not 
wish  to  go  backward.  Nor  do  they  care  to  preserve  relics — except 
as  relics.  They  are  conservatively  progressive.  In  the  ranks  of 
the  Lord's  hosts  the  Pisgah  church,  for  instance,  may  not  lead  the 
van;  but  neither  is  she  of  that  company  whose  practice  it  is  "to 
fire  and  fall  back,"  nor  yet  is  she  of  those  who  "stay  by  the  stuff." 
But  her  place  is  in  the  center  of  the  firing  line.  With  its  advance 
she  moves — and  moves  forward.  This  spirit  is  finely  illustrated 
by  two  incidents  in  the  life  of  the  church.  In  the  year  1811,  we 
are  told,  the  Presbytery — in  a  mood  of  despondency,  let  us  hope — 
gave  official  advice  to  the  Versailles,  Woodford,  and  Pisgah  churches 
to  imite  and  build  one  "commodious  house  of  worship"  for  all 
three.  Pisgah  heard  this  advice;  but  she  did  not  heed  it.  Instead 
she  moved  further  up  her  hillside,  and  built  a  house  of  stone — 
all  for  herself.  And  when,  in  1868,  she  went  about  to  remodel 
that  building,  she  realized  the  need  of  a  change,  dear  as  the  old 
house  was;  but  she  did  not  fall  a  victim  to  mere  enterprise.  She 
did  not  build  a  structure  fitted  for  the  city  square,  nor  yet  one  for 
the  village  street.  But  she  shaped  the  new  roof  like  the  arches  of 
her  native  woods,  planted  the  clinging  ivy  about  the  grey  stones' 
dug  from  the  native  limestone,  and  left  her  sanctuary  a  shrine  in 
God's  "Out-of-doors."  The  spirit  of  Pisgah  is  a  spirit  of  peace, 
and  ol  prudence ;  of  loyalty  and  high  courage ;  that  hastes  not  from 
the  old  times,  vet  thankfully  moves  toward  the  new. 


30 


^Ije  ^isigaf)  of  tEobap 

EEE  and  there  are  woodland  pastures  giving  a  faint 
suggestion  of  the  glor}^  of  the  primeval  forest  that 
once  crowned  the  gently  rolling  lands  where  the 
^^  Scotch-Irish  from  Virginia  and  Pennsylvania  first 
made  their  homes  in  Woodford  county,  and  where  their  descend- 
ants dwell  today.  But  the  forest  has  passed  away.  It  is  a  land 
of  fertile  fields,  that  instantly,  with  but  the  slightest  encourage- 
ment from  the  husbandman,  go  back  to  rich  pastures  fit  to  keep 
the  finest  live  stock  in  the  world.  The  comfortable  homes  of  the 
last  generation  have  not  been  allowed,  by  the  children,  to  fall 
into  decay.  On  all  sides  they  dot  the  beautiful  landscape,  their 
inviting,  sheltering  appearance  only  adding  the  human  element 
that  harmonizes  with  its  beauty.  Gradually  into  these  homes  are 
coming  the  modern  conveniences  to  which  cities  and  towns  can  no 
longer  claim  exclusive  right. 

There  is  a  feature  of  the  landscape  which  is  distinctly  modern, 
and  which  in  late  years  has  been  introduced  throughout  Central 
Kentucky.  It  is  not  a  beautiful  feature.  It  is  the  unsightly 
"tenant  house."  This  is  a  part  of  the  result  of  the  culture  of 
tobacco.  The  house  itself  is  a  necessity.  But  its  hideous- 
ness  is  not.  The  stock-raising  fathers  of  fifty  years  ago 
saw  to  it  that  no  ugly  thing  in  building  or  fence  should  mar  the 
beauty  of  their  homesteads,  and  their  Central  Kentucky  farms  at- 
tained a  world-wide  fame.  Their  sons  are  making  a  mistake  in 
not  following  their  example.  It  is  well  nigh  certain  that  all  over 
the  Blue  Grass  section  this  mistake  will  be  seen,  and  the  man  who 
tends  a  tobacco  crop  will  be  given  an  opportunity  to  take  care  of 
a  pretty  and  comfortable,  though  not  expensive  home.  And  the 
landlord  will  see  that  it  is  best  also  for  himself. 

The  old  roll  of  Pisgah  church,  that  of  1808,  is  extended  to 
include  also  a  list  of  the  families,  recording  the  parents  and  all 
the  children,  whether  the  latter  were  in  communion  with  the 
church  or  not.  We  are  impressed  by  the  length  of  those  family 
rolls.    Almost  every  house  seems  to  have  been  filled  with  children, 

40 


Such  is  not  the  case  with  the  native  families  of  the  community 
today.  But  the  life  of  the  community  and  of  the  church  is  vigo- 
rous. Neither  of  them  is  in  a  state  of  decay.  The  people  are  not 
moving  away,  nor  is  there  any  feeling  among  them  that  to  do  so 
would  be  either  desirable  or  wise.  There  is  the  same  spirit  among 
the  Pisgah  of  the  present  that  has  been  shown  by  it  in  the  past. 
And  it  may  be  said  without  qualification,  that  all  that  is  best  in 
their  traditions  is  not  only  preserved  by  them,  but  is  an  active  and 
strong  force  in  their  lives  today.  The  people  of  Pisgah  are 
genial,  without  coarseness;  polite,  without  stiffness;  modest,  with- 
out shyness;  simple,  without  crudeness;  refined,  without  snob- 
bishness, and  religious,  without  sanctimoniousness. 

In  its  last  yearly  report  to  Presbytery,  that  of  April  1st, 
1909,  the  church  stated  its  membership  as  eighty-four,  not  far 
from  the  average  for  its  entire  history.  The  services  are  well 
attended,  and  the  spirit  of  worship  that  pervades  every  service 
(and  they  are  of  the  simplest  sort)  does  not  fail  to  impress  the 
stranger.  The  congregation  is  interested  in,  and  contributes  to, 
all  the  great  work  of  our  Southern  Church  as  a  whole.  In  April 
of  this  year  she  reported  for  the  twelve  months  previous  contribu- 
tions to  all  causes,  including  her  own  local  expenses,  to  the 
amount  of  $1,160.  In  the  church  especially  there  is  a  growing 
determination  to  receive,  welcome,  and  keep  all  whom  God's  provi- 
dence may  send  to  Pisgah,  and  to  seek  and  find  whatsoever  work 
he  has  given  the  church  to  do. 

The  Pisgah  of  today  is  interested  in  her  past.  She  has  looked 
into  its  record,  recalled  its  story,  and  taken  pains  to  preserve  its 
mementos.  But  Pisgah  is  of  the  present,  and  she  knows  it.  Like- 
wise, also,  she  believes — aye,  is  very  sure,  that  for  her  there  is 
also  a  future.    To  it  she  looks  with  equal  hope  and  gratefulness. 

The  Church  as  it  is  Today. 
The  roll  of  members  appears  as  a  part  of  the  general  roll  at  the 
end  of  this  book. 

OFFICERS 

W.  0.  Shewmaker,  Pastor. 

Euling  Elders— E.  S.  Hart,  M.  D.,  W.  A.  Cox,  J.  W.  Garrett. 
Clerk  of  Session — E.  S.  Hart. 

Deacons — P.  G.  Powell,  Sr.,  J.  Horace  Gay,  E.  H.  Wason, 
Jas.  T.  Cox,  Chairman  of  Board. 

41 


Superintendent  of  Grounds  and  Buildings — J  as.  T.  Cox. 

SUNDAY   SCHOOL 

W.  A.  Cox,  Superintendent. 

J.  Gay  Hanna,  Secretary. 

Miss  Catherine  Falconer,  Librarian. 

Miss  Mary  A.  Cox,  Superintendent  of  Primary  Department. 

Robert  Garrett,  Assistant  in  Primary  Department. 

Miss  Margaret  Hart,  Assistant  in  Primary  Department. 

Mrs.  Jas.  T.  Cox,  Intermediate  Teacher  and  Home  Depart- 
ment Superintendent. 

Mrs.  Mary  Mcllvain,  Intermediate  Teacher. 

E.  S.  Hart,  Junior  Adult  Teacher. 

W.  0.  Shewmaker,  Senior  Adult  Teacher  and  Normal  Class 
Instructor. 

Number  of  Pupils,  seventy-six. 

SOCIETIES 

The  Ladies'  Missionary  Society. 
The  Douglas  Missionary  Band. 

SERVICES 

Every  Sabbath,  11  o'clock,  a.  m..  Preaching. 
Every   Wednesday  afternoon.   Prayer-meeting. 
Communion  Services,  once  each  quarter,  on  dates  announced. 
Sunday    School    every    Sabbath,    10    o'clock,    a.    m.,    regular 
session. 

Twice  each  month,  at  dates  announced,  the  Normal  Class. 

SOCIETY    MEETINGS 

Ladies  Missionary,  last  Friday  in  each  month. 

Douglas  Missionary  Band,  the  fourth  Sabbath  of  each  month, 
in  the  afternoon. 

Session  Meetings,  once  each  quarter,  prior  to  Communion. 

Board  of  Deacons,  once  each  quarter. 

In  addition  to  the  above-mentioned  Church  organizations, 
there  was  formed  in  1908  the  Pisgah  Cemetery  Improvement 
Association.  The  object  of  this  organization  is  to  give  special 
care  and  attention  to  the  cemetery  and  the  grounds  immediately 
about  the  church.  It's  membership  is  designed  to  include  not  only 
those  who  are  members  of  the  church,  but  who  may  for  any  reason 
be  interested  in  the  care  of  the  cemetery  or  the  property.     It  is 

42 


organized,  however,  subject  entirely  to  the  authority  of  the  session 
of  the  church,  the  ruling  elders  of  that  body  being  also  the  trustees 
of  all  the  church  property.  They  have  already  in  hand  a  small 
nucleus  of  a  fund  to  secure  the  proper  care  of  the  cemetery.  It  is 
their  purpose  to  increase  this  fund  until  it  will  yield  a  considerable 
income,  thus  securing  the  cemetery  against  the  ruin  that  is  the 
fate  of  nearly  all  country  grave  yards.  They  are  prepared  to 
receive  contributions  to  this  fund  at  all  times.  The  officers  are 
J.  Wilmore  Garrett,  Sr.,  President,  and  Miss  Mary  A.  Cox,  Secre- 
tary-Treasurer, with  a  board  of  directors.  Jas.  T.  Cox  is  Superin- 
tendent of  Cemetery.  The  Association  meets  regularly  twice  n 
year  at  the  call  of  the  President. 


43 


^ift  Celebration 


N  October  7th,  1909,  the  Pisgah  church  celebrated 
the  one  hundred  and  twenty-fifth  anniversary  of  its 
founding.  The  day  was  perfect.  October  weather 
in  Kentucky  is  often  as  charming  as  can  be  found  at 
any  season  anywhere.  The  sky  was  without  a  cloud,  but  the  bright 
sunshine  fell,  softened  by  the  thin  haze,  which,  finer  than  gos- 
samer, hung  over  the  whole  landscape  just  sufficiently  strong  in 
fiber  to  give  faint  tints  of  amethyst  and  opal  to  the  atmosphere. 
The  pastures  were  yet  green ;  the  trees  and  vines  just  touched  with 
the  first  flush  of  the  colors  of  the  fall.  Preparations  had  been 
made  and  plans  formed  for  weeks  before.  The  church  was  deco- 
rated with  potted  plants  of  unbroken  green.  Just  to  the  east  of 
the  school  house,  and  somewhat  in  front  of  it,  a  pavilion  forty 
feet  wide  and  eighty  feet  long  had  been  stretched.  Within  this 
there  were  tables,  chairs,  plates,  and  all  the  equipment  of  a  dining 
room  for  the  accommodation  of  three  hundred  and  twenty-five 
people.  At  10  o'clock,  a.  m.,  the  following  program  was  begun, 
and  carried  out  without  change. 

10:00  a.  m.  (In  the  church). 
Doxology. 

Invocation — Eev.    F.   W.   Hinitt,   D.   D.,   Central   University, 
Danville,  Ky. 

Hymn — "All  Hail  the  Power  of  Jesus'  Name." 
Roll  call  of  members. 

Hymn — "The   Church's  One   Foundation.'^ 
Address:    "Pisgah's  Past"— Rev.  W.  0.  Shewmaker,  Pisgah. 
Prayer  of  Thanksgiving— Lead  by  Dr.  D.  Clay  Lilly,  Nicholas- 
ville,   Ky. 

Hymn— "For  All  Tlie  Saints." 
■Reading  of  Scripture— Psalms  148  and   149. 
Solo:    "Come  Unto   Me  All  Ye  that  Labor  and   are   Heavy 
Laden" — Miss  Beardsley,  Kansas  City,  Mo. 

44 


Sermon — Eev,  J.  S.  Lyons,  D.  D.,  Louisville,  Ky.  Text, 
Is.  32:2. 

The   Pisgah  Memorial   Hymn — By  Mrs.   Douglas. 

Prayer  and  Dismissal — Led  by  Dr.  Edwin  Muller,  Lexing- 
ton, Ky. 

11. 

12:30  p.  m.   (At  the  table). 
Lunch. 
Greetings — 

From    the    First    Presbyterian    Church,    Lexington,    Ky. — ■ 

Mr,   T.   T.   Forman,  Lexington,  Ky. 
From    the    Presbytery — Rev.    W.     0.     Cochrane,    George- 
town,  Ky. 
From  Absent  Friends — Letters  read  by  Dr.  R.  S.  Hart. 
Centennial  Poems,  by  Mrs.  Douglas — Read  by  Mr.  Desha 
Breckinridge. 

(a)  The  Church. 

(b)  The  School  House. 

III. 

3:00   p.   m.    (The  audience   being   too   large  for  the  church,   the 
dining  tent  was  now  used). 
Hymn— "0,  Could  I  Speak  the  Matchless  Worth." 
Solo:    "The  Plains  of  Peace"— Mrs.  Cannon,  Midway,  Ky. 
Address— Rev.  F.  W.  Hinitt,  D.  D.,  Danville,  Ky. 

Subject :   ''Religion  and   Education." 
Prayer — Led  by  Dr.   Lyons. 
x\nnouncements. 
Hymn— "0,  God  of  Bethel." 
Benediction — Rev.  L.  H.  Blanton,  D.  D.,  Danville,  Ky. 

The  lunch  was  served  in  successive  "tables,"  fully  seven  hun- 
dred people  in  all  partaking,  including  the  Pisgah  people  them- 
selves. There  were  at  least  five  hundred  guests.  The  Memorial 
Hymn  mentioned  above,  as  well  as  the  Centennial  Poems,  were 
written  by  Mrs.  Rutherford  Douglas,  wife  of  Dr.  Douglas,  whose 
pastorate  of  the  church  was  the  longest  in  its  history.  She  is  also 
the  daughter  of  the  famous  President  of  Centre  College,  the  late 
Dr.  John  C.  Young,  her  mother  being  a  Breckinridge.  She  is  the 
mother  of  Rev.  Rutherford  E.  Douglas,  D.  D.,  of  Macon,  Ga.     All 

45 


I 


of  these  relationships,  besides  her  own  membership  in  Pisgah. 
make  it  appropriate  that  she  should  contribute  the  verses  of 
the  Pisgah  Hymn.     It  is  as  follows: 


PISGAH  MEMORIAL  HYMN 

(Tune:  "America.") 
Church  of  my  ancestry, 
Spot  ever  dear  to  me. 

Of  thee  I  sing. 
Church  of  their  life-long  pride 
Where  they  in  death  abide; 
From  hill  and  valley  wide 

Let  our  songs  ring. 

Sing  of  our  fathers  bold. 
Who  in  the  days  of  old 

Sought  the  far  west. 
Knightly  of  soul  they  were, 
"T\''ithout  reproach  or  fear," 
Counting  their  lives  not  dear 

In  their  high  quest. 

Here — the  long  journej'^  done — 
Here,  with  the  victory  won. 

Where  they  found  rest. 
Stands  their  loved  church  today. 
Ivy  crowned,  old  and  grey. 
In  her  prosperity 

Blessing  and  blessed. 

Father  in  Heaven,  do  Thou, 
As  in  Thy  temple  now. 

Humbly  we  bend, 
Teach  us  Thy  name  to  bless. 
Fill  us  with  thankfulness 
For  all  the  hapj^iness 

Which  Thou  dost  send. 

Our  Father's  CJod,  we  lay 
This,  their  memorial  day. 

Low  at  Thy  feet. 
Crown  it  with  peace  and  love 
From  Thy  bright  courts  above; 
Let  it  a  blessing  prove. 

Hallowed  and  sweet. 

46 


Of  the  occasion  one  who  was  present,  and  who  knows  whereof 
he  writes,  wrote  the  following  which,  since  it  is  as  much  a  tribute 
to  guests  as  to  hosts,  is  here  quoted  in  full: 

(Editorial  in  Lexington  Morning  Herald  October  8,  1909) 

"we  aee  sorry  por  you." 

"We  are  sorry  for  all  of  you  who  did  not  go  to  the  celebration 
of  the  one  hundred  and  twenty-fifth  anniversary  of  the  founding 
of  Pisgah  church  yesterday.  You  may  have  somewhere  gone  to 
some  celebration  or  entertainment  you  thought  delightful;  you 
may  sometime  in  the  future  go  to  some  other  celebration  which 
will  be  charming;  but  if  you  missed  the  celebration  yesterday  you 
will  never  have  an  opportunity  to  attend  another  just  so  delightful 
and  so  charming. 

"More  perfect  days  may  have  been.  It  is  possible,  we  doubt 
not,  for  the  Lord  to  make  a  more  perfect  day  than  was  yesterday. 
But  He  never  has  yet.  In  the  exquisite  setting  of  woodland  and 
Blue  Grass  with  <^hich  Pisgah  is  surrounded,  there  were  gathered 
together  between  five  and  six  hundred  of  those  who  have  ties  to 
that  church,  a  body  of  men  and  women  that  can  not  be  surpassed 
— we  do  not  fcelieve  equalled — by  a  similar  body  of  equal  numbers 
in  any  State  in  the  Union.  From  far  distant  neighborhoods  came 
those  who,  because  of  ancestral  ties  or  childhood  memories,  hold 
sacred  the  traditions  of  the  church  which  is  unique  in  Kentucky. 

"We  are  not  so  familiar  with  the  history  of  the  churches  of 
Kentucky  that  we  may  speak  with  authority,  but  we  believe  Pisgah 
to  be  the  oldest  country  church  in  the  State;  we  have  never  heard 
of  another  church  where  the  pastorate  of  two  men  covered  a  period 
of  nearly  three-quarters  of  a  century,  as  did  the  pastorate  of  two 
of  the  ministers  at  Pisgah.  The  neighborhood  of  which  Pisgah  is 
the  center,  founded  as  it  was  by  the  most  stalwart  and  most  God- 
fearing type  of  pioneer  immigrants  from  Virginia,  has  maintained 
more  than  almost  any  other  neighborhood  in  Kentucky  the  char- 
acter impressed  upon  it  by  the  first  settlers. 

"Every  time  we  have  the  privilege  of  mingling  with  a  crowd  of 
the  country  gentlemen  and  gentlewomen  of  the  Blue  Grass,  we 
are  impressed,  and  we  were  more  deeply  than  usually  impressed 
yesterday  by  the  wonderful  character,  bearing,  intelligence,  educa- 
tion, and  social  ease  of  the  people. of  this  region.  We  do  not  believe 
that  in  any  section  of  America,  whether  in  city  or  in  country, 

47 


there  could  be  gathered  together  a  like  number  of  people  under 
like  circumstances,  as  were  those  gathered  at  Pisgah  yesterday,  the 
average  of  whom  would  be  as  high  in  all  the  graces  of  social  life 
blossoming  upon  as  sturdy  character  and  as  real  kindliness.  They 
know  no  superior  save  God ;  they  treat  no  one  created  in  the  image 
of  God  as  inferior.  The  evidence  given  of  executive  capacity  in 
the  arrangemeijts  for  caring  for  the  comfort  of  those  who  attended 
and  in  providing  a  dinner  which  was  both  delicious  and  over- 
abundant, with  old  ham,  mutton,  chicken,  salads,  beaten  biscuit, 
rolls,  cakes,  pies,  coffee — everything  in  profusion,  with  no  definite 
knowledge  of  the  number  who  would  attend — there  were  no  R. 
S.  V.  P.'s  on  the  invitations — was  an  evidence  of  the  high  order 
of  abilit}'  of  those  in  charge  of  the  celebration. 

"We  do  not  comment  at  the  present  upon  the  speeches  delivered, 
of  which  the  news  columns  of  this  and  other  issues  of  The  Herald 
will  tell.  We  write  this  simply  to  express  our  profound  sympathy 
for  all  of  you  poor  people  who  were  not  so  fortunate  as  to  be 
there  " 


I.  The  Records  of  a  Century. 

"A  Session  Book  or  Register  of  the  Church  of  Pisgah,  com- 
mencing from  the  beginning  of  the  Year  of  Our  Lord  1808,  etc.. 
etc.  This  church  at  the  period  above  mentioned  consisted  of  the 
following  members  in  communion,  to-wit:  First,  Church  Session 
as  follows.  James  Blythe,  Pastor;  Francis  Allen,  James  Martin, 
James  Wardlaw,  Hugh  Ferguson,  Isaac  Stevenson.  Secondly,  all 
other  persons  in  communion,  as  follows." 

Thus  opens  the  earliest  known  record  of  Pisgih  church.  The 
names  on  the  roll  are  given  in  the  general  list  later  in  this  book. 
There  are  fifty-seven  members  besides  officers.  The  total  mem- 
bership, according  to  this  roll,  being  sixty-two.  Then  follows  the 
list  of  communicants  who  are  heads  of  families,  and  their  children, 
Then  the  old  clerk  writes :  "Next  follows  in  order  the  proceedings 
etc.,  of  said  church,  Births,  Baptisms,  Marriages,  Deaths,  Re- 
newals, etc;"  and  he  is  faithful  to  this.  The  first  entry  is,  "James 
and  Sally  Arm.strong,  children  of  John  Armstrong,  baptized 
August,  1808."     There  is  a  blank  between  the  month  and  year, 

48 


He  intended  to  get  the  date  exactly  from  some  one  who  remembered 
the  day.  A  century  has  gone,  and  there  the  blank  is  still  unfilled: 
the  Armstrong  infants  having  long  since  grown  up  and  gone  the 
way  of  all  the  earth. 

The  first  death  recorded  is  the  next  entry,  that  of  William 
Stevenson,  Sr.,  on  July  12,  1808.  In  the  early  portion  of  this 
book  the  minutes  of  the  session  are  but  poorly  recorded,  but  the 
births,  marriages,  deaths,  etc.,  seem  to  be  carefully  put  down. 
The  first  minutes  of  Session  stands  thus:  ''May  7th  day,  1809. 
Session  met  agreeable  to  appointment;  present,  James  Blythe. 
mod.,  together  with  all  the  elders.  Nancy  Kirkham,  widow,  re- 
ceived in  communion  on  examination.^' 

The  first  statistical  report  recorded  in  the  session  book  is  that 
of  September  20th,  1816.     It  is  as  follows: 

Total  in  communion  per  last  report 42 

Added  on  examination   2 

Died 2 

Dismissed 2 

Total  in  communion    41 

Baptized  since  last  communion 1 

Adults    6 

Infants    7 

Total    7 

The  yearly  report  is  copied  into  the  book  for  nearly  every  year 
until  1866,  when  it  abruptly  ceases  to  appear.  But  again  we  find 
it  regularly  recorded  each  year,  beginning  with  1893. 

We  find  the  first  reference  to  "the  Missionary  Society  in  Pisgah 
Church"  in  April,  1831,  but  there  is  no  account  anywhere  of  its 
organization.  Nor  is  there  any  account  in  the  records  of  the 
beginning  of  the  weekly  prayer-meeting,  although  there  is  fre- 
quent mention  in  the  earlier  record  of  the  "concert  of  pra3^er"  for 
foreign  missions,  which  used  to  meet  on  Sunday  afternoon  each 
month  just  before  the  first  Monday  in  the  month.  But  the  reason 
for  mention  of  this  is  doubtless  the  fact  that  it  was  customary  at 
these  meetings  "to  lift  a  collection."  The  Sunday  school  is  not 
mentioned  except  as  it  begins  to  appear  in  the  reports  to  Pres- 
bytery. Nor  is  there  any  record  of  the  organization  of  the  Young 
People's  Society. 

Curious  entries  to  us  of  today,  and  destined  to  grow  more  so 
as  the  generations  pass,  are  such  as  those  notices  of  members 

49 


that  are  thus  recorded,  for  instance,  "Billy,  a  slave,"  or  "Lucy,  a 
woman  of  color,  belonging  to  so-and-so."' 

Later  on  these  records  show  a  greater  correctness  as  to  form, 
but  their  content  is  often  so  little  as  to  disappoint  us.  For  in- 
stance, the  record  of  removals  and  marriages  almost  ceases  for  a 
long  period.  We  learn  from  them  that  the  membership  of  the 
church  has  never  been  large,  the  very  largest  ever  recorded  being 
150,  in  1847,  the  average  being  somewhere  in  the  neighborhood  of 
90.  The  cash  salary  paid  the  pastors  begins  with  $130,  as  re- 
corded, ascends  by  degrees  to  $1,000,  descends  to  $800,  and  then 
drops  to  $600,  where  it  has  remained  for  about  twelve  years. 
The  church  has  always  responded  to  calls  for  contributions  to 
the  general  work  of  the  church.  Pisgah  sends  commissioners  with 
almost  unbroken  regularity  to  the  church  courts,  and  her  records, 
though  for  a  long  period  not  before  the  Presbytery,  are  as  a  rule 
approved  when  reviewed. 

The  clerks,  whose  diligence  has  kept  these  records  of  a  century, 
have  been : 

Nathaniel   Ferguson,  January   1,   1808 — September   21,   1836. 

Eev.  Jacob  F.  Price,  September  21,  1836— June  3,  1847. 

Eben  Milton,  June  3,  1847— April  10,  1853. 

Dr.  R.  H.  Wason,  April  10,  1853— September  9,  1891. 

Dr.  R.  S.  Hart,  September  9,  1891— 

Mr.  Ferguson,  Mr.  Price,  and  Dr.  Wason  all  died  in  office. 
Mr.  Milton  resigned.     Dr.  Hart  is  the  present  clerk. 

Spread  upon  the  minutes  of  the  churcli  is  the  following  pa- 
thetic paper: 

2.     The  farewell  letter  of  the  Rev.  Joseph  P.  Cunningham. 

"25th  August,  1833. 
"To  the  Dear  Brethren  of  Pisgah  Church: 

"The  long  looked  for,  and  on  my  part  dreadfully  painful  hour 
has  come.  We  must  separate  as  Minister  and  People.  To  human 
appearance  it  is  impossible  to  hope  that  I  can  serve  you  any  longer 
in  the  Gospel.  I  fear  my  days  on  earth  are  well  nigh  numbered 
Thru  grace  T  ain  able  to  contemplate  my  latter  end  with  com- 
posure. I  know  in  whom  I  have  believed.  'I  know  that  my  Re- 
deemer liveth,'  that  is  all  sufficient. 

'T^t  would  be  improper  to  keep  you  bound  or  restricted  from 
procuring  another  minister,  whom  you  so  much  need,  when  it  is 

50 


almost  certain  I  can  never  serve  you  again.  I  trust  God  will  es- 
pecially direct  and  bless  you  in  making  another  selection.  You 
will  never  admit  an  unsound  or  even  doubtful  man  into  your 
pulpit.  By  the  Spirit  bring  them  to  the  standard — God's  Word 
and  the  confession  of  your  church.  During  the  four  months  I 
served  you  my  uniform  and  earnest  effort  was  to  present  the  plain, 
prominent  and  essential  truths  of  the  Gospel.  I  was  always  grati- 
fied to  see,  as  I  hoped,  such  truths  acceptable  to  the  congregation. 
But  you  have  been  well  indoctrinated  in  former  years  if  you  have 
attended  to  the  things  you  have  heard.  Brethren  continue  in  the 
faith  rooted  and  grounded,  let  no  vain  Jangler  deceive  you;  go  on 
in  your  long  established  method  of  doing  all  things  in  peace  and 
the  God  of  Peace  will  be  with  you.  If  I  live  I  shall  rejoice  tc 
hear  of  your  order,  harmony  and  firmness  in  the  faith  and  your 
abounding  in  all  good  works.  Don't  forget  the  cause  of  Christ 
and  don't  give  up  this  indispensable  evidence  that  you  are  a 
Church  of  Clu-ist. 

"  'That  man  may  last,  but  never  lives, 
Who  much  receives,  but  little  gives. 
Whom  none  can  love,  whom  none  can  thank. 
Creation's  blot.  Creation's  blank.' 

"Christ  shed  his  blood  freely  for  you,  not  with  silver  and  gold, 
shining  dust  merely,  but  with  the  heart's  blood  of  God's  Son 
were  you  redeemed. 

"I  do  think  that  the  abundance  of  worldly  good  things  and  the 
great  excitements  to  the  amassing  of  wealth  are  the  dangers  which 
most  beset  you  now.  Eemember  who  said,  'Ye  cannot  serve  God 
and  mammon,'  again,  'How  hardly  shall  they  that  have  riches 
enter  into  the  Kingdon  of  Heaven.'  Again  it  is  impossible  to 
guard  against  rancor  of  the  soul.  As  a  tender  mother  in  Israel 
don't  forget  your  children — when  they  cry  for  bread,  feed  them. 
By  the  hope  of  the  church  and  of  society,  by  the  value  of  immortal 
souls,  I  charge  you  not  to  neglect  the  Sabbath  school. 

"My  dear  impenitent  friends,  seek  the  Lord  while  he  may  be 
found,  call  ye  upon  Him  while  he  is  near.  I  call  the  Lord  to 
witness  that  I  have  warned  you  of  the  danger  to  come  and  urged 
you  to  flee  to  the  stronghold.  Brethren,  we  have  lived  in  peace 
and  we  part  in  peace.     With  a  heart  too  full  to  see  you  and  a 

51 


hand   too  leverish  and  feeble  to  meet  yours,  I  write  farewell  to 
the  dear,  beloved  brethren  of  Pisgah  Church." 

"J.  P.  Cunningham." 

3.  There  are,  also,  in  these  records  resolutions  passed  at 
such  times  as  the  resignations  and  deaths  of  pastors.  And  there 
two  interesting  sets  of  resolutions  of  the  session  passed  and  re- 
corded at  different  times,  but  both  during  the  pastorate  of  Mr. 
Price.  They  each  are  a  faint  echo  of  the  controversy  between 
"Old  School''  and  "New  School,"  and  are  both  strong  indorse- 
ments of  the  preacliing  and  character  of  their  pastor.  Now  and 
then  also  is  a  record  of  some  case  of  discipline,  the  intense  feeling 
and  grave  issues  involved  in  them  being  shown  by  the  full  record 
of  the  testimony  of  witnesses.  The  reader  of  today  looks  upon 
these  records  of  real  tragedy  with  wonder,  not  unmixed  with 
amusement. 

4.  A  summary  of  Gospel  Doctrine  and  Christian  Duty  being 
a  Sermon  delivered  to  the  Church  and  Congregation 

at   Pisgah 
on  the  resignation  of  the  pastoral  charge  after  a 
connection  of  forty  years. 
By  James  Blythe,  D.  D. 
Published  by  request  of  the  Church. 
Such  is  the  title  of  a  pamphlet  of  sixteen  closely-printed  pages, 
four  by  six  inches,  printed  by  Thomas  T.  Skillman,  Lexington. 
Ky.,  in  the  year  1832. 

It  is  accompanied  by  an  introductory  note,  which  is  as  follows  : 

Pisgah,    November    6,    1832. 
Rev.  and  dear  Sir: 

Sincerely  approving  the  doctrines  and  counsel  contained  in 
your  farewell  sermon  to  the  Pisgah  congregation,  and  from  a 
wish  expressed  by  many  of  our  people,  we  are  induced  to  ask  you 
to  furnish  us  with  that  sermon  for  publication.  Believing  it 
will  not  only  be  useful  to  this  church,  but  to  the  community 
at  large.  Very  affectionately  yours,  etc., 

N.    Ferguson, 
Jas.  Marten, 
Jas.    Stevenson, 
John    Milton, 
J.  S.  Berry  man, 
Rev.  J.  Blythe,  D.  D.  Pisgah  Session. 

52 


Dear  Brethren : 

I  received  your  note  requesting  a  copy  of  my  last  sermon  among 
you,  for  publication.  I  will  furnish  a  copy,  because  I  hope  the 
discourse  contains  nothing  but  Gospel  truth,  and  such  pastoral 
counsel  as  may  be  beneficial  to  you  and  your  children.  I  also  feel 
desirous  that  the  churches  in  Kentucky  among  which  I  have  labored 
so  long,  should  be  furnished  with  a  succinct  view  of  what  I  deem 
to  be  the  doctrines  of  the  Bible  and  our  standards.  Praying  that 
God  may  bless  you,  and  make  the  sermon  promotive  of  truth  and 
piety,  I  subscribe  myself,  dear  brethren,  yours  in  the  bonds  of 
Christian  affection,  James   Blythe. 

Then  follows  the  text :  "Finally,  brethren,  farewell ;  be  per- 
fect, be  of  good  comfort,  be  of  one  mind,  live  in  peace,  and  the 
God  of  love  and  peace  shall  be  with  you." — 2  Corinthians,  13  :11. 

"We  transcribe  a  short  synopsis  of  the  sermon. 

It  opens  thus :  "To  recount  the  past  struggles,  temptations  and 
felicities  of  our  Christian  course,  and,  with  confidence  in  God  to 
look  forward  to  those  that  may  come,  form  at  once  the  duty,  hap- 
piness and  safety  of  the  Christian."  Then,  quoting  the  language 
of  Paul,  "And  now  I  go  bound  in  the  Spirit  unto  Jerusalem,"  etc., 
the  Doctor  adds,  "Let  the  Apostle's  conduct  be  our  example  to- 
day. While  we  take  a  hasty  view  of  the  way  in  which  God  has 
led  this  church  and  myself,  we  will  be  of  good  comfort.  Let  us 
also  recount  some  of  the  duties  which  lie  before  us;  and  thus  close 
that  delightful  relation  which  has  subsisted  between  this  church 
and  myself  for  forty  years.  The  remembrance  of  the  first  day  I 
came  among  you  has  always  been  to  me  a  delight  and  the  cause  of 
gratitude.  I  found  this  church  in  a  divided  and  distracted  con- 
dition. Though  but  a  youth  and  a  stranger,  God  so  blessed  my 
feeble  efforts  that  peace  and  concord  were  restored. 

At  that  time  I  had  not  the  most  distant  idea  of  ever  being  a 
citizen  of  this  State,  yet,  perhaps,  the  events  of  that  day  led  ulti- 
mately to  the  union  between  this  church  and  myself,  which  has 
been  so  protracted,  and  so  delightful.  I  became  your  pastor.  For 
forty  years  I  have  labored  to  know  nothing  among  you  but  Jesus 
and  Him  crucified.  *  *  *  *  j  fggj  desirous  that  this,  my 
last  sermon  among  you,  should  not  be  a  mere  effusion  of  feeling, 
but  should  contain  something  that,  when  I  am  no  more  with  you, 
may  serve  the  people  whom  I  love  more  than  any  other  people  on 
earth,  as  a  criterion  of  truth  and  a  guide  in  duty.    Therefore :  I.    I 

53 


shall  in  the  first  place  briefly  state  what  I  have  labored  to  preach 
among  3'ou,  and,  II,  Throw  together  a  few  directions  as  to  your 
future  duty.  I  pursue  this  course  that  you  may  be  of  good  com- 
fort of  mind  and  that  you  may  live  in  peace." 

Under  the  fii'st  head  he  reminds  them  that  he  has  always 
taught  the  following  doctrines: 

1.  "Human  nature  as  it  is  depicted  in  the  Bible/' 

2.  "The  doctrine  of  imputation." 

3.  "That  intimately  connected  with  man's  total  depravity,  and 
necessarily  growing  out  of  it,  his  utter  inability  to  help  himself." 

4.  "The  Spirit,  the  third  person  in  the  Trinity,  as  operating  a 
part  as  important  and  distinctive  in  the  economy  of  grace  as  that 
performed  by  the  Savior  Himself." 

5.  "I  have  labored  to  draw  you  near  the  cross." 

6.  "I  have  held  up  Christ  to  you  as  a  sufferer." 

In  division  II.  he  gives  them  directions  as,  first,  members  of 
the  church  at  large,  to  contend  earnestly  for  the  truth,  never 
bitterly.  Second,  As  Presbj^erians,  against  heresy  and  against 
disorder.  Third,  "As  private  Christians,"  "Be  perfect,"  "Be  of 
good  comfort,"  "Remember  the  duties  of  the  closet,"  "Eemember 
the  duty  of  family  religion,"  "Remember  the  duties  you  owe  to 
your  children  and  servants,"  "Remember  the  duties  you  owe  to 
this  church  in  particular."    "Be  of  one  mind,  live  in  peace." 

He  closes  with  a  tender  prayer  for  "this  dear  church"  in  the 
words  of  the  Apostle  Paul,  "the  God  of  love  and  peace  shall  be 
with  you." 


# 


54 


THE  PARSONAGE. 
"The  red  breast  loves  to  build  and  warble  there." 


Centennial  ^oemg 


THE  CHURCH 
(By  Mrs.  C.  Y.  Douglas.) 
A  hundred  years  have  come  and  gone, 
With  their  alternate  light  and  shade 
Since  from  the  Fort  at  Lexington 
Eode  out  one  morn,  a  cavalcade. 

A  band  of  sturdy  pioneers. 

With  hearts  of  oak  and  limbs  of  steel, 
With  wives  who  had  left  home  and  friends 

To  follow  them  for  woe  or  weal. 

Dunlaps  and  Stevensons  and  Gays, 

Kindred  and  friends  in  the  days  of  yore. 

Brothers  in  heart  in  this  far  off  land. 
With  a  love  they  had  never  known  before. 

And  from  the  Fort  their  ranks  to  swell. 
Adventurous  spirits,  true  and  tried, 

Came  others — lured  from  distant  homes 

By  the  call  of  the  wild,  from  the  forest  wide. 

Wasons  and  Mcllvains  and  Stones, 

Aliens  and  Trimbles,  men  of  miaht. 

Whose  sires  had  braved  the  stormy  seas 

For  freedom  to  worship  God  aright. 

Age  and  manhood  and  youth  were  there. 
And  happy  childhood  with  the  rest. 

And  one — a  tender  infant  smiled 
Upon  its  mother^s  sheltered  breast. 

55 


We  know  not  if  the  sun  shone  fair. 
Or  if  the  twittering  birds  of  spring 
Made  vocal  all  the  balmy  air 
With  their  sweet  songs  of  welcoming. 

But  even  though  the  wild  March  winds 
Moaned  "neath  a  sky  of  leaden  hue, 

We  know  their  hearts  were  light  and  gaj, 
Were  not  their  homes  almost  in  view  ? 

Forgotten  were  their  wanderings 

O'er  mountains  high,  through  forests  drear. 
Their  perils  by  the  swollen  stream 

Their  nightly  vigils  kept  in  fear. 

O'er  hill  and  dale  they  made  their  way. 
Forest  and  stream  and  canebrake  passed; 

Each  pulse  leaped  high,  each  eye  grew  bright. 
For  home,  sweet  home,  was  won  at  last. 

And  then  as  the  patriarchs  of  old. 

Those  steadfast  souls  kneeled  on  the  sod. 

"And  the  dim  aisles  of  the  forest  rang" 
As  they  reared  an  altar  to  their  God. 

They  laid  foundations  broad  and  deep. 
In  humble,  earnest,  constant  prayer. 

And  on  them  reared,  in  faith  and  hope, 
The  towers  of  Pisgah,  proud  and  fair. 

They  lived  no  lives  of  sloth  and  ease. 

Those  sturdy  tillers  of  the  soil. 
The  desert  blossomed  as  the  rose 

Beneath  their  faithful,  patient  toil. 

Their  lives  were  much  as  ours  are  now. 

Pain  and  pleasure — and  strength  as  their  day. 

And  one  by  one,  their  life's  work  done. 

They  passed  from  the  scenes  of  earth  away. 

56 


Where  are  they  now?    Those  grassy  mounds 

In  yon  churchyard  the  tale  will  tell. 
They  all  are  laid  beneath  the  shade 

Of  the  church  they  built  and  loved  so  well. 

The  infant  of  the  Fort  was  brought, 

A  lonely  woman  worn  and  old, 
In  after  years  from  afar  to  rest 

With  her  kindred  dust  in  the  church-yard  mold. 

The  storms  and  snows  of  ninety  years 

Had  bowed  her  form  and  blanched  her  head, 

How  well  that  the  last  of  all  should  lie 
With  the  loved  and  the  lost  of  long  ago. 

Peace  to  their  silent  sleeping  dust. 

Their  memories  shall  never  die. 
In  the  sacred  shrines  of  our  innermost  hearts 

We  will  keep  them  green  forever  and  aye. 

And  so  we  lay  a  wreath  today 

On  the  graves  of  our  heroes  unknown  to  fame, 
Who  have  left  to  their  posterity 

Their  church,  their  lands,  and  their  spotless  name. 

The  years  shall  come  and  the  years  shall  go. 
In  their  ceaseless  flight  and  their  silent  sweep 

While  the  worthy  sons  of  their  honored  sires 
Their  sacred  heritage  shall  keep. 


THE  SCHOOL  HOUSE 
(By  Mrs.  C.  Y.  Douglas.) 
Beneath  the  shadows  cold  and  dim. 
Of  many  a  gnarled  and  twisted  limb. 
With  hoary  walls  all  grey  and  grim 

The  ancient  school  house  stands. 
Silent  save  for  the  night  wind's  moan, 
Round  its  deserted  walls  and  lone — 
Fashioned  a  century  agone 

"By  long-forgotten  hands." 
57 


Encrusting  mosses  thickly  rest 
Upon  its  roof.    With  tranquil  breast. 
The  timid  bird  above  her  nest, 

Beneath  the  sheltering  eaves, 
Broods  in  the  solitude  profound, 
The  solemn  hush  that  reigns  around, 
Lulled  by  the  low  and  murmurous  sound 

Of  softly  whispering  leaves. 


Oh  I     Where  are  all  the  spirits  bright 
Who  filled  tliese  halls  with  life  and  light, 
And  went  to  battle  for  the  right. 
With  faith  and  courage  high? 
Alas !     How  in  the  strife  they  fell. 
How  few  returned  the  tale  to  tell. 
And  'mid  the  scenes  they  loved  so  well, 
In  Death's  long  sleep  to  lie. 


Some  heard  in  youth  their  country's  call. 
And  sprang  to  arms,  to  fight,  to  fall, 
Giving  for  her  their  life,  their  all. 
Wrapped  in  the  soldier's  crimson  pall 

On  many  a  field  they  lie. 
From  where  the  stormy  North  Winds  blow. 
O'er  rockbound  coasts  and  wastes  of  snow. 
To  where  the  gulf's  bright  waters  flow. 
Chanting  in  numbers  soft  and  slow 

A  hero's  lullaby. 


Some  from  these  classic  shades  have  gone 
In  splendid  line  from  sire  to  son. 
And  from  a  Nation's  heart  have  won 

A  Nation's  love  and  trust. 
Writing  high  on  the  roll  of  Fame 
The  sage's,  statesman's,  patriot's  name 
In  letters  that  will  flash  and  flame 

When  these  grey  stones  are  dust. 


58 


And  some  of  Love  and  Faith  possessed. 
With  burning  zeal  and  dauntless  breast 
Into  the  world's  broad  field  have  pressed. 

Embassadors  of  Peace. 
Bearing  aloft  in  all  men's  sight 
Their  banner,  Christ's  evangel  bright, 
Inscribed  in  characters  of  light 

With  messages  of  Grace. 


And  some.  Oh!  sweet  and  blessed  life. 

Far  from  the  mad  arena  rife. 

With  pain  and  passion,  sin  and  strife. 

Their  quiet  years  have  passed. 
Have  lived,  and  loved,  and  passed  away 
To  mingle  with  their  kindred  clay 
'TJntil  the  shadows  flee  away 

And  the  day  break  at  last." 


Come  weal !     Come  woe !    Whate'er  betide 
Out  on  Life's  ocean  wild  and  wide. 
They  fought  and  fell  always  beside. 

Then,  Life's  brief  pageant  o'er. 
Each  weary  heart  sinks  down  to  rest 
As  infant  on  its  mother's  breast 
(Or  when  or  where?     God  knoweth  best) 
In  dreamless  slumber  deep  and  blest. 

Till  time  shall  be  no  more. 


Peace  to  their  dust!    Where'er  they  lie 
'Neath  ocean's  wave  or  sunny  sky. 
Their  names,  we  would  not  let  them  die 

As  they  had  never  been; 
But  gathering  from  far  and  near 
On  this  fair  spot,  to  all  so  dear, 
A  hallowed  altar  would  we  rear 

To  keep  their  memories  green. 

59 


And  when  we  in  our  turn  have  done. 
With  all  that  lies  beneath  the  sun. 
When  pilgrims'  feet  the  race  have  run 
And  longing  hearts  the  goal  have  won. 

Softly  and  reverently 
Others  with  gentle  hands  shall  come 
To  bear  us  to  our  last  long  home, 
And  light  above  each  silent  tomb. 
To  gild  with  radiance  its  gloom — 

The  torch  of  Memory. 


m 


®l)e  laoU  Caa  of  n  Jlunbreb  §tavB 

MEMBERS  OF  PISGAH  CHURCH  1808-1909 

The  following  names  are  all  those  that  appear  upon  the  church 
records  written  the  dates  named.  No  earlier  roll  than  that  of 
January  1st,  1808,  is  known  to  exist.  Names  are  copied  as  they 
are  on  the  record. 


Moses   Mcllvain 

James    Stevenson 

Margaret    Mcllvain 

Joshua  Whittington 

Wm.    Mcllvain 

Mary   Stevenson 

John  Armstrong 

Sarah   Dunlap 

James    Ritchie 

Archibald  Kinkead 

Jane    Ritchie 

Wm.    Stevenson 

Phebe  Ferguson 

Susanna    Stevenson 

Arthur   Campbell 

Martha    Martin 

Elizabeth   Campbell 

Susanna  Aikin 

Joseph  Robb 

Mrs.    Sarah    Gay    Mcllvain 

Mrs.  Elinor  Robb  Logan 

Sarah    Gay 

Alexander  Black 

Abram,    (a   slave) 

Agnes    Black 

Lucy,    (a  slave) 

Agnes   Steele 

1809. 

Polly    Steele 

Nancy   Kirkham 

\\"m.   ]\IcPheeters 

Agnes  Marshall 

Hugh    Muldrow 

Jane    Muldrow 

1813. 

Samuel   Stevenson 

Browrn 

Jane   Stevenson 

1_>1  U  W  11 

Mary   Stevenson 

George  Campbell 

1814. 

Nancy  Campbell 

Mrs.   Mary  Lackland 

Nancy    Kirkham 

Mrs.  Jane   Carr 

James  Rennick 

Mary   Rennick 

1816. 

Lydia   Rennick 

Mrs.    Mary   Smith 

Margaret  Rennick 

Col.    Tunstall    Quarles 

John  Elliott 

Ellender  Elliott 

1817. 

Rebecca  Allen 

Mrs.  Mary  Gordon 

James  White 

Jane   Allen 

Elizabeth  White 

Rebecca   Gay 

John    McMahon 

Mary    McMahon 

1818. 

Benj.   Stevenson 

Cornelius  Hoolman 

Mary  Stevenson 

Jane    Carr 

Mary   Long 

Mrs.  Campbell 

Joanna  Campbell 

Mrs.  Polly  McCullough 

Margaret    Stevenson 

Mrs.   Catherine   Milton 

Mary   Stevenson 

Mrs.   Frances  Armstrong 

Elizabeth  Elliott 

Mrs.   Nancy  Quarles 

James   Stevenson,   Sr. 

Livy   Bohannon 

61 

George  Burgen 
Rebecca  Burgen 

1819. 
Mrs.   Margaret   Compton 
Wm.  R.  Thompson 
Wm.    (L.)    Breckinridge 

1820 
Willis    Green 

Mrs.    Myra   Maddison   Alexander 
Chas.    Marshall 
John    McClung 
Wm.    Marshall 
James   Boardman 
Lewis  Green 
Thomas  Taylor 
Billy   (a  man  of  color) 
America  Mattox 
Mrs.    Rachel    Aluldrow 
Mrs.    Mary   Allen 
Mrs.  Matilda  Berryman 
Mrs.    Jane    Harris 
Samuel   P.   Menzis 
Thos.    (Little)   Lytel 

1821 
Mrs.    Mary   Martin 
James   Stevenson,  Jr. 
Mrs.  Martia  Hamilton 

1822 
Mrs.  Nancy  Watson 
Mrs.  Anny  Buford 
John  K.  Lee 
Eliza    Raleigh 

Alley    (a  woman   of  color) 
Robert    Elliott 

1823 
Sarah    Williams 
Mrs.   Isabella  Scott 

1824 
Mrs.    Sarah    McClure 

1825 
Wm.    Shaw 
James   Elliott 
Mrs.    Mary    Cox 

1826 
Eliza   Jane    Stevenson 
Samuel    Shaw 
Mrs.   Sarah   Elliott 

1827 
James    S.    Berryman 
Sarah    Armstrong 
Mrs.    Susan    Hart 
Mrs.  Margaret  Thompson 


Samuel    Thompson 

Kinkead    Gay 

Robt.    E.    Schrogan 

Eve     (coloerd    woman) 

Mrs.   Jane   Worley 

Mrs.  Jane  Gay 

Mrs.  Eliza  Jane  Stevenson 

Harriet    Scrogan 

Mrs.    Ann    Scrogan    Collins 

Mrs.   Nancy  Young  Winkfield 

Hetty    (colored   person) 

Davie    (colored    person) 

Hannah    (colored    person) 

Elizah    Milton 

Frederick    Waltz 

Wm.   Allen 

John    Milton 

Louisa   Milton 

Mrs.    Mary    Catherine   Taylor   Berry 

Wm.    Stevenson 

Jane  Stevenson 

Bushrod    Milton 

George  Lingenfelter 

Mrs.   Jane    Martin 

Hannah    W.    Blair 

Lucy    (colored  woman) 

Daniel    Orr 

Mima    (colored   woman) 

1828 
Lancelot    Clark 

Mrs.  Elizabeth  Ann  Stevenson  Cooper 
Mrs.  Sarah  Elliott 
John  W.  Mcllvain 
(Irene)    Hensley 
Jane  Eliza  Orr 
Marth    Martin 
Robt.   Martin 
Samuel  Aikin 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Clark 
Mrs.    Sarah    Bohannon 
Isaac   (colored  man) 
Airs.  Ann  Aikin 
Sophia   M.    Frazier 
James    Gay 
Mrs.  Catherine  Gay 
Jane   Young 
Elizabeth  Waltz 
Mrs.  Lucinda  Young  McMillan 
Minerva   Scrogan 
John  Buford 
Emily   Stevenson 
Wm.  Rankin 
Mrs.  Margaret  Rankin 
Mrs.    Sarah   Williams 
Mrs.  Jane  Allen   Hedger 
Mrs.  "ittaly   Martin 
Mrs.    Mary   Burnum 
Andrew  Z.   Sowin 
Dabby    (woman  of  color) 
John    Steele 
62 


Wm.  Wallace 

Isaac  (colored  man) 

John  Martin 

Jane   Simonton 

Margaret  Hammons 

James  Williams 

Mrs.  Sarah  L.  Frazier  Logan 

Robt.  Harvey  Waso'^ 

Wm.    H.   Burnum 

Mrs.  Margaret  S.  Stevenson  WasonEdmund   (colored  man) 


Mary  F.  Aikin 
Martha  Ann  McCrosky 
Mrs.   Sophia   Smedley 
James  Martin,  Jr. 

1836 

America    Gaines 
Samuel  Schrogan 
John  W.   Stevenson 


Emaline  J.  Broughton 
John  Martin,  Jr. 
Luther   C.    Schrogan 
Milly  Davis 
Elizabeth    Schrogan 
Stephen  (colored  person) 
Airs.  Mary  J.  Ritchey  Pearson 

1829 
Mrs.  Sarah  Ann  Young 

1830 
Mrs.   Elizabeth  Waltz 
Frederick  Bush 

1832 
Mrs.   Mary   Stevenson 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Stevenson 
Martha  McClure 
Mrs.  Emily  Milton 
Sarah  Cligget 


M.  S.  Robinson 
Chas.  W.  Castleman 

1837 
Ralph  E.   Smith 
Catherine    Hunter 
Dr.  Lewis  Marshall 
.Agatha  Marshall 
Geo.    Parsons 
Miss   Eliza   Alexander 
Rebecca   Mcllvain 

1838 
George  C.    Spencer 
Amelia    Spencer 

1839 

Mrs.    P.   Craven 
Louisa  Bohannon 
Mrs.  Mary  Ann  Phillips 
Miss    Nancy    McClure 
Agatha  Marshall 
Cyrus  Hedger 


1840 
Alexander  Dinsmore 


1833 

Samuel   Aikin 

Ann  Aikin 

Mrs.  Elizabeth  Cunningham 

John  j  CI  f  i\/r      r-        •     t,      Mrs.  Mary  Bissell 

Winnery  ]  Slaves  of  Mrs.  Cunnrngham^^^f^^    ^^^^  ^   ^.^^ 

Mrs.  Mary  Clagget 
Mrs.    Sallv    Elliott 
Ann  Elliott 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Bush 
Mrs.  Jane  Berry 
Hetty    (colored  person) 
Thos.    Wason 
Jack  (colored  person) 
Nancy   (Colored  person) 
Mrs.   Jane   Ritchey 
Mary  Ann  Carlisle 
^^'alter   C.   Ferguson 
Ferabanite   Hensley 
Mrs.  Juliet  N.  Jackson 


1834 
Elizabeth   Alexander 

1835 
Mrs.   Nancv  Ann   Milton 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Milton 
Jane  Morgan 
Mrs.  Jane  Sandusky 


Bissell 
1841 
Mrs.   Matilda  Cox 
E.  F.  Easton 
Amanda  Easton 
Ebin   Milton 
Hugh  Allen,  Jr. 
Augustus  Bailey 
James  Wardlow 
Ann  L.  McGee 
Dr.  Reuben  Berry 
Gillead   Polk 
Eliza  B.  Milton 
Bushrod  Castleman 
Alexander  Stevenson 
Thos.  P.  Allen 
Garrot  Young 
Polly  Allen 
Eliza  Ann  Sullivan 
Malinda  Rennick 
Eliza   McCrosky 
William  Colman 
Elizabeth  Kent  Alexander 
Ann   Smedlv 
63 


Catherine  Burner 
William  Burrier 
Rebecca  Burrier 
William  Milton 
Henry  Berry 
Hannah  E.  Castleman 
Louisa  C.  Milton 
Martha  Ann  Aikin 
Samuel  Aikin,  Jr. 
Harlow   Spencer 
Susan  Risk 
John  A.  Stogdel 
Martha  J.  Irvine 
Thomas  Young 
Archimedes  G.  Elliott 
Martha    Allen 
John  Milton,  Jr. 
Steohen  G.  Tutt 
Hulda  Ann  Elliott 
Zerilda    Sanders 
Amanda  D.  Risk 
Elizabeth  Milton 
Nancy   Stogdel 
John  J.  Reid 
Margaret  C.  Reid 
Robert  Allen 
William  H.   Martin 
John   Neet 
Columbia  Offet 
Allice  Ann  Allen 
Jane  Abraham  Hunter 
John    P.    Aikin 
Samuel   Ritchie 
Elizabeth  L.  Hunter 
Mary  William  Elliott 
Glass   Marshall 
Mary  P.  Thompson 

1842 
Joseph  Frazier 
Robert  Wilkerson 
Addison  Milton 
Elizabeth   Florida  Milor 
Sarah  Elizabeth  Castleman 
Wm.  M.  Scott 
Friend  Perin 
John    Jackson 
Man,'   Berry 

1843 
Eliza  Ca  colored  woman  of  E, 


John    Valentine 


1844 


C.  M.  Dermont 


1845 


1846 
Mar>'  Jane  Sullivan 
Robt.  Stevenson 


Robt.  Stevenson,  Jr. 
Margaret    McKing 
Mary  Jane  Neet 
Rebecca   Allen 
Mary   Allen 
Louisa  Allen 
A.  Cox 

1847 
James  Graves 
Martha  E.   McPheeters 
Virginia  Berry 
Elizabeth  W.   Stevenson 
Davidella  H.  Neet 
Elizabeth  S.  Berry 
Robt.  L.  Haney 
Davis  S.  S.  McPheeters 
Mrs.    Isabella    Parsons 
Sarah  C.   Stevenson 
Lucy  Berry 
Wm.  H.  Stevenson 
Charles  W.  Price 
G.   Bushrod   Stevenson 
James    P.   Gay 
Tarlton  C.  Miles 
Mary  Waltz 

Virginia  L.  Neet  Moore 
Clarinda    E.    Stevenson 
Lucy  Ann  Stevenson 
Nicholas  Warden 
Sarah   P.Milton 
Mary  Milton 
Mary  E.  Wason 
Mrs.   Margaret   Gay  Wason 
Martha  C.  Castleman 
Walter  Ferguson 
Mrs.  H.  C.  Bohannon 
James  H.  Henderson 
Chloe  J.   Price 
Eliza   (colored) 
Eliza    (slave) 
Judy    (slave) 
Louisa   (slave) 
Harriet    (slave) 
Jacob    (slave) 
Thornton    (slave) 
Hetty    (slave) 
Sallv    (slave) 
Huldah    (slave) 
Mary  Jane   (slave) 
Fields)  Henry   (colored) 
David  Riley 
Martha    Riley 

1848 
Guy  P.  Hamilton 
Marcia  TTnniliton 
David  Smith 
Joseph  M.  Dean 
Agnes  Gay 
Robert  Garret 
64 


1851 
Mrs.  H.  Wheeler 

1852 
Watson  Gay 
Mrs.  F.  J.  Patrick 

1853 
Tidbault  Milton 
Harlow    Spencer 
Mrs.  F.  J.   Patrick 

1854 
James  Allen 
Eliza  Allen 
Margaret  A.  M.  Allen 
Mrs.  Sarah  Stevenson 
T.  J.  Settle 
Jas.   Hale 
Miss  Lucinda  Haney 

1855 
Emily    (colored) 
Dr.  W.  Douglass  Gay 
Mrs.   Kate  Gay 
Mrs.  Anne  Wheeler 
Miss  Jennie  Worley 
Miss  Jennie  Walker 
Rebecca  W.  Gay 
C.  T.  Cox 
Hugh  Hedger 
Flem   Hedger 
Wm.  Dunn 
James  B.  Milton 
Harvey  Doggins 
Wm.  T.  Smith 
Eben  Taylor 
James  A.  Wason 
John  Scearce 
Esther    (colored) 
Bushrod  Castleman 
Ebin  Milton 
Isabella  Alexander 

1856 
Mrs.  Theodosia  Hall 
Miss   Maria   Sackett 
Mrs.  Mary  Jane  Spencer 

1857 
Robt.   Hedger 
Wm.  T.  Wason 

1858 
Sarah  Bettie  Gay 
Mrs.  Mary  Bosworth 
Wm.   Martin 
Andy  (colored) 
Miss  Ann  D.  Martin 


1860 
Mrs.  Caroline  Douglas 
Mary  Louisa  Castleman 

1861 
Miss  Mary  Ellen  Hedger 
Miss  Anna  M.  Wason 
Mrs.  N.  M.  Douglas 
Mrs.  E.  Coiifman 

1863 

Miss   Mary   Caroline  Allen 
Mrs.  Nannie  James 

1864 
Geo.  B.   Waltz 

Mrs.    Mary   Waltz 

1865 
Berry  Stevenson 
Chas.  Hedger 

1866 
Mrs.  Kate  Garrett 
Walter  F.  Bohon 
Miss  Jessie  Neet 
Samuel  Holloway 
Wm.  A.  Hall 
Miss  Florence  Bohon 
Miss  Belle  Hall 
Miss    Bettie    Hall 
Rebecca  W.  Wason 
Miss    Bettie   Allen 
Wm.    Wright 
James  Stevenson,  Jr. 
J.   Smith  Taylor 
Hugh  Allen 

Will  Henry  Easing  (colored) 
Miss  Sallie  E.  Stevenson 
James  E.   Neet 
James  Garrett 
Mrs.  Lucinda  Cassell 
Col.  Oliver  Anderson 
Mrs.  Louisa  Anderson 
Mrs.  Kate  Akers 


1867 


J.  R.   Stockdell 
Nancy  Stockdell 

1868 
John   Evans 
A.  Spencer 

1869 
Jane    Spencer 
Mrs.  Sallie  Falconer 
Jane   McEachin 
P.  G.  Powell 
Mrs.  Henrietta  Powell 
65 


1870 
J.   W.   Mcllvain 
Mrs.  Mary  Mcllvain 

1871 
George  L.  Douglas 
VVm.  A.  Cox 
Mary  Rebecca  Wright 
Maggie  Gay 
James  L.  Gay 
Theo.    H.    Wallace 
Mrs.   Sallie  McEachin 

1872 
Kate  C.  Wason 
Lon  E.  Rennick 
Henry  Mehring 
Maggie  Cheney 
Carrie   D.    Wason 
Charles  Hieber 
Miss  Annie  Spencer 
John    Lafon 
Watson   Gay 

1873 
Dr.  William  Brother 
Mrs.  C.  E.  Brother 
Miss  Marj'  Cox 

1874 
Miss   Mary   McEachin 
Miss  Bettie  Powell 
William  Gay 
Thos.  Shelby 
Charles  Wallace 
J.  A.   Falconer 
Mrs.  Jane  Hollowav 
Ella  Wallace 
Derrill   Hart 
Lou  Hart 

1875 
R.  S.  Hart 
Mrs.  Eliza  Stanhope 
Miss  Lula  Stanhope 
Miss   Mollie   Settle 
Miss  Mattie  A.  Settle 
J.  Wilmore  Garrett 

1876 
Miss  Lucy  A.  Armistead 
Maggie  Burner 
Nancy  Arnsi)arger 
Mi<;s    S.    I',    .'\rnsparger 
John  Arnsparger 
Mary  T.  Dillard 
Mary  Hieber 
Charles  A.  Stevenson 
John  T.  Wason 
Sue  Ann  Giltner 
Robt.  H.  Wason,  Jr. 
Mrs.  C.  A.  Stevenson 


Miss  Kate  Hall 
James   Gay 
Miss   Stella  Knobe 
Eliza  Watkins 
Elijah    Watkins 
I\lrs.  Bettie  Gay 
W.  A.  Slay  maker 
Mrs.  H.  C.  Slaymaker 
Hunter  Brother 
Jake   Sandusky 
CaroHne  Sandusky 

1877 
Richard  Kirby  Stanhope 
G.   A.    Spencer 
Mrs.  Jane  Spencer 
Miss  Annie  Spencer 

1878 

Mrs.  Betty  Sandusky 
Laura  Bohon 
Kitty   Sandusky 

1879 
AUine  Brother 
Lewis  N.  Van  Meter 
Mary  E.   Worley 

1880 
James   Cox 
Mary  Lee  Gay 
Michael    Powell 
Robert  James 
Joseph    Garrett 
Rutherford  E.  Douglas 
Charles  Powell 
A.  E.  Spencer 
Anna  AI.  Worley 
Mrs.  Sallie  Gay 

1881 
Mrs.   Susie  L.   Sandusky 

1882 
Miss  Matilda  Cox 
Miss  Carrie  Rutherford  Gay 

1883 
H.  W.  Worley 
Miss  Bessie  Falconer 
Miss  Bessie  Sandusky 
Miss  Kate  Falconer 
Francis  Douglas 
J.   E.   Boatwright 

1884 
Miss  Mary  L.  Gay 
Miss  Julia  Sandusky 
Miss  Drusilla  Douglas 
Miss  Laura  Arnsparger 
Mrs.  Ruth  E.  Hieber 
66 


Mrs.  Hattie  Littrell 

Horace  Gay 

Mrs.  Mary  Hieber 

Charles  Hieber 

Kir  by   Grimes 

Aliss   MoUie   Dole 

Richard  Hieber 

B.  R.  Marshall 

Caesar  Mcllvaiu  (colored) 

John  Reese 

1885 
Miss  Eugenia   Stout 

1886 
Mr.  Wm.  Laurie 
Mrs.  Wm.  Laurie 
Mrs.   S.   McCrohan 

1888 
Mrs.  Virginia  Gay 

1890 
Mrs.  Hannah  A.  Cox 
Miss  Dora  Hieber 
John  Falconer 
James   Smith 
Majean  Burner 
Hattie  Smith 
Paul  Brother 
Zachariah  Wardle 
Mary  F.  Wardle 

1891 
Miss  Anne  Stoakley 
William   Hicks 
Mrs.  Hattie  Newman 
H.  Q.  Newman 

1892 
Lillian  AlcPhail  Ervin 
Peter  G.  Powell,  Jr. 
Mary   Ervin 

1893 
Mrs.  Mary  Smith 
Mrs.   Emma  A.   Powell 
Mrs.  Alma  Brooks  Wason 
J.  Tyler  Nash 
Thomas  L.  Nash 
George  P.  Nash 
]\Irs.  Mantha  Littrell 
Miss  Bertie  Carrel 
Mary  Kate  Hieber 
John    Hieber 
S.   M.    Stedman 
Miss   Eliza  Redding 
John   W.   Ervin 
Charlton  Morton 
Benjamin   R.   Hart 
Mr.  Martin 


Mrs.   Lucy  Jones   Marks 

1894 
Mrs.  Susan  Smithers 
Miss   Catherine   Shaw 
Mr.  A.  M.  Brock 
Miss  Alice  Brock 
Miss  Elizabeth  Carpenter 
Mr.   Hughes 
Miss  Katherine  Gay 
Mrs.   Sarah  M.  Powell 
Mr.   Henry   Smithers 
James   Smithers 
Mrs.  Ella  Smithers 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Parker 

1896 
Mr.  Claude  Kendall 
Mrs.  Laura  A.  Kendall 
Roger  H.  Smith 
Morgan  Smedley 

1897 

Mrs.  Mary  E.  W.  Groves 
John  E.  Groves 
Mrs.   Bettie   H.   Groves 
Mrs.  Fanny  Van  Pelt  Groves 
Mrs.  Katherine  Clarke  Garrett 
Mrs.  Mary  Talbott  Wason 
Oliver  Higgins  Farra 
Miss  Mollie  E.  Daugherty 
Mrs.  Mary  Caroline  Parker 
George  L.   Douglas 
Andrew  Bowman 
Catherine  Reed  Bowman 
Margaret  Wason  Garrett 
Robert  Garrett 
Margaret  Rebecca  Hart 
Robert   S.   Hart.  Jr. 
Mrs.  Mary  H.  Powell 
Richard  Hieber,  Jr. 
Martha   Virginia   Hieber 
Catherine  Coleman  Smedley 
Addie  Lee  Parker 
Amelia  Marion  Groves 
Mrs.  Mary  A.  J.  Powell 

1898 
Miss  Margaret  M.  Littrell 
Miss   Lulie  Littrell 
Miss  Mattie  Mary  Littrell 


Rosa   Kaenzig 


1900 


1901 
Charles   T.    Cox 
Mary   W.   Hart 
Ella  L.  Carpenter 
Wm.   Smith 
67 


1902 
B.  F.  Wise 
A.    H.    McCray 
Sallie  James  Hanna  . 
John   Gay   Hannah 
Maria  Louise  Hanna 
Maud   D.   Cox 
Ida  W.   Cox 
J.  Wilmore  Garrett,  Jr. 
Bessie  Harris 
Newton   Gay 
Mr.  Tom  Littrell 
Mrs.  Julia  Spurgeon 
John  A.  Jackson 
Derrill    Hart 

1903 
Harvey  W.  Smedley 

1905 
Mary  Louise  Garrett 


James  Douglas  Garrett 
Harrison  Littrell 
Annie  Hieber 
Mrs.  Viola  Lyons 

1907 
George  W.  Smedley 
Jesse  H.  Burrier 

1908 
Robert  McDonald  Garrett 
James  Robert  Cox 
Lewis    Gay    Nash 
Mrs.    Nancy   Parker 
Mr.  Clinton  Parker 
Electra  Woodhall 
J.  Tyler   Xash,  Jr. 
Cora  Littrell 
Odell  Littrell. 


"For  all  the  saints  who  from  their  labors  rest, 
Who  Thee  b}'^  faith  before  the  world  confessed, 
Thy  name,  0  Jesus,  be  forever  blest. 
Alleluia !" 


68 


THE  PASTURE  AT  THE  PARSONAGE. 
"Far    from    the   madding   crowd's    ignol^le    strife; 


etc  0itn  Wi)Q  ?|atje  i-erbeb  ^iggaij 

THE  MINISTERS 

The  dates  given  cover  the  entire  period  of  connection  with  the 
church,  in  each  case. 

1784 — 1793  Adam  Eankin;  deposed. 

1791—1832  Jas.  Blythe,  D.  D.;  resigned. 

1832 — 1833  Joseph  Cunningham;  died  in  office. 

1834 — 1847  Jacob  F.  Price;  died  in  office. 

1848—1852  S.  M.  Bayless;  resigned. 

1852—1853  W.  C.  McPheeters;  stated  supply,  only. 

1853—1857  Eobert  W.  Allen;  resigned. 

1857—1890  Eutherford  Douglas,  D.  D. ;  died  in  office. 

1890 — 1897  Erasmus  E.  Ervin;  resigned. 

1897 — 1903  Coleman  0.  Groves;  resigned. 

1903 —  W.  Orpheus  Shewmaker;  present  pastor. 

Euling  Elders  known  to  have  served: 

Wm.  Scott,  Francis  Allen,  Alexander  Dunlap,  Isaac  Stevenson, 
James  Wardlow,  Hugh  Ferguson,  Nathaniel  Ferguson  (the  two 
seem  to  have  probably  been  the  same  man),  James  Martin,  Jolm 
Allen,  John  Stevenson,  Sr.,  J.  S.  Berryman,  William  Allen,  John 
Neet,  John  Martin,  Dr.  Louis  Marshall,  Dr.  Eob't.  H.  Wason,  Chas. 
T.  Cox,  Almon  Spencer,  Dr.  Eob't  S.  Hart,  J.  Wilmore  Garrett  and 
Wm.  Allen  Cox.  The  three  last  are  still  serving.  The  rest  have  all 
passed  to  the  General  Assembly  on  high. 

Deacons  known  to  have  served : 

Eobert  Allen,  J.  A.  Elliott,  Wm.  Burrier,  Jno.  Valentine,  James 
E.  Gay,  Chas.  T.  Cox,  Elijah  Watkins,  Eobert  Garrett,  Joseph  W. 
Garrett,  Chas.  Mc.  Powell,  Peter  G.  Powell,  Eob't  H.  Wason,  J. 
Horace  Gay  and  Jas.  T.  Cox. 

The  last  four  constitute  the  present  Board.  Mr.  Chas.  M. 
Powell  has  removed  from  this  community,  and  from  this  church. 
The  others  have  been  called  up  higher. 

69 


The  Eev.  John  Brown — and  Pisgah. 

Note — There  is  a  widely  current,  and  somewhat  persistent, 
report  (it  can  scercely  be  called  a  tradition)  that  the  Rev,  John 
Brown,  familiarly  known  as  "Parson"  Brown,  was  once  a  pastor 
of  Pisgah.  He  is  usually  referred  to  in  this  connection  as  the  first 
pastor.  It  will  be  noticed  that  his  name  does  not  appear  in  the  list 
of  pastors  given  above.  And  these  are  the  reasons  for  that  omission. 
It  is  known  certainly  that  the  Eev.  Jolm  Brown  lived  at  "Sum- 
ner's Forest,"  his  home,  within  three  miles  of  Pisgah  church,  the 
property  to-day  still  being  in  possession  of  his  kindred;  that  he 
came  here  in  1797,  from  Virginia,  and  that  when  he  died  in  Prank- 
fort  in  1803  his  body  was  brought  to  the  Pisgah  church  yard  and 
buried  there,  being  afterwards  moved  and  reinterred  in  Frankfort. 
Now  it  will  be  remembered  that  in  1797,  when  Mr.  Brown  came, 
Pisgah  church  was  already  thirteen  years  old.  Adam  Rankin  had 
been  in  charge  of  it  from  1784 — 1792.  And  Dr.  Blythe  had  been 
serving  it  as  pastor  and  stated  supply  together  for  about  six  years, 
and  continued,  as  he  tells  us  in  his  farewell  sermon,  "an  unbroken 
connection"  with  the  church  until  1832.  In  the  meantime  Jolm 
BrowTi  died  in  1803.    Thus  there  is  no  place  for  his  pastorate. 

Besides  that,  Mr.  Brown  was  a  very  eminent  minister  in  his  day. 
His  sons  also  were  distinguished  men.  Of  them  James  Brown  and 
Jolm  Brown,  became  the  one  minister  to  France,  and  the  other 
United  States  Senator ;  while  Dr.  Samuel  Bro\vn  was  a  distinguished 
member  of  the  Medical  Faculty  of  Transylvania  University,  when 
its  school  of  medicine  was  famous.  It  is  then  very  easy  to  find  out 
certainly  the  main  facts  of  his  life.  When  he  moved  to  Kentucky 
he  had  already  been  in  the  ministry  forty-four  years,  was  sixty- 
nine  years  of  age,  and,  as  Davidson,  the  historian,  says  of  him,  was 
"in  the  decline  of  life."  When  he  resigned  his  charge  in  Virginia  to 
come  to  Kentucky  it  meant  his  retirement  from  the  active  ministry. 

Besides  these  facts,  his  name  does  not  appear  as  a  member  of 
either  Transylvania,  or  West  Lexington,  Presbytery.  And,  as  is 
well  known,  he  could  not  have  been  a  pastor  of  Pisgah  without 
being  a  member  of  the  Presbytery  to  which  it  belonged.  It  is 
altogether  probal)le  that  he  occasionally,  and  perhaps  frequently 
as  his  strength  permitted  and  circumstances  gave  opportunity, 
preached  at  Pisgah.  But  however  much  Pisgah  may  desire  to  claim 
as  part  of  her  history  a  place  in  the  ministry  of  so  eminent  a  man 
she  is  prevented  from  so  doing  ])y  the  facts  and  the  record. 

70 


Conclusion 

It  is  a  conviction  of  the  writer  and  compiler  of  these  pages  that 
our  people  of  Central  Kentucky  need  to  be  reminded  of,  and  taught 
their  own  history.  We  have  been  brought  up  on  boasting  as  to  our 
past.  What  we  need  is  not  to  be  taught  to  be  proud  of  it  (that 
will  take  care  of  itself)  but  to  know  it.  We  need  to  find  out  what 
it  was.  Especially  is  this  true  in  the  case  of  our  local  church 
history.  No  other  churches  have  quite  such  an  advantage  in  the 
matter  of  being  able  to  furnish  interesting  history  as  the 
churches  in  the  country.  Their  life  as  institutions  is  not  over- 
shadowed by,  or  combatted  by  other  institutions.  And  there  is  not 
an  old  country  church  in  our  region,  of  whatever  denomination,  that 
could  not  write  an  interesting,  instructive  and  inspiring  history. 
And  these  histories  should  be  written  for  the  sake  of  them  who  can 
be  thereby  taught  and  inspired. 

Whatever  may  be  in  store  for  the  country  communities,  and 
the  churches  in  them  and  of  them,  Pisgah,  though  in  times  past 
stronger  in  numbers,  and  much  stronger  in  material  wealth,  looks 
yet  forward.  For  her  name  is  the  same  as  that  of  the  Mount  of 
God  from  whose  peak  Moses  looked  out  upon  the  Land  of  Promise, 
which  was  to  hold  the  great  future  of  his  people.  And  in  this  she 
reads  an  omen — or,  rather,  sees  a  token. 


!a  Hafit  OTorb,  anb  one  tfjat  la  ^erjSonal 

Those  who  turn  the  foregoing  pages  must  bear  in  mind  that 
while  this  volume  is  called  "The  Pisgah  Book,"  and  while  the 
sale  of  it  is  conducted  by  the  Ladies'  Missionary  Society  of  the 
church,  and  whatsoever  profits  may  come  from  the  sale  are  to 
be  used  for  the  benefit  of  the  church,  yet  the  book  is  not  at  all  an 
enterprise  of  the  church.  It  is  entirely  the  author's  own.  He 
alone  is  responsible  for  the  presentation  of  these  pages,  which 
were  prepared  for  publication  ^vithout  advice  or  assistance  from 
any  one  of  the  members  of  Pisgah  Church.  So  then,  if  certain 
passages  are  found  in  the  book  which  seem  to  sound  the  praises  of 
Pisgah,  let  it  be  remembered  that  these  are  not  instances  of  self- 
praise,  for  it  is  not  the  people  who  are  writing.  And,  in  this 
connection,  the  author  will  say  further  that  whatsoever  of  esteem 
for  Pisgah's  people  is  herein  expressed  is  but  that  which  has  ut- 
tered itself  after  his  most  determined  effort  at  self-restraint. 

THE  END 


DOXOLOGY 


"Now  unto  him  that  is  able  to  guard  you  from  stumbling,  and 
to  set  you  before  the  presence  of  his  glory  without  blemish  in 
exceeding  joy,  to  the  only  God  our  Savior,  through  Jesus  Christ 
our  Loi-d,  be  glory,  majesty,  dominion  and  power,  before  all  time, 
and  now  and  for  evermore.     Amen.'' — Jude  24-25. 


72 


THE  LIBRARY 

UNIVEK^>1TY  OP  ^WFORNIA 

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This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


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